Once and Future King
by Lunar
Summary: What is a king to do? Kain would hardly call himself 'savior' material. But with Raziel a sword, the Hylden breaking loose, and a squid-with-delusions-underground? Its not like anyone ELSE is volunteering to save the world... A LoK:Defiance continuation.
1. Chapter 1

**Legacy of Kain: Once And Future King**

(AU / Continuation fan-fiction for Legacy of Kain Defiance)

/../- implies vampiric 'whisper' a.k.a. telepathy/mental projection.

The Soul Reaver isn't capable of speech as such, but I gave it dialog anyway to show that Kain can interpret its wordless snark without difficulty? I have no idea. Just go with it.

**The End: Chapter 1-**

There was an odd timelessness to the air Kain realized as he studied the sky. Fractured granite blocks shifted and shed pebbles around the shattered observation room, but the earthy noises of structural decay didn't bother him. Even the urgency he felt as he watched Hash'a'gik winging off in Janos Audron's body was secondary to the all encompassing silence that radiated from within. Glancing down, Kain smiled briefly at the sight of the Soul Reaver, his once again. The sinister looking sword flickered with soundless white fire. Its insubstantial flames coiled over the hilt, and up his arm. The sensation wasn't an unpleasant one.

"Troublesome child." He scolded his sword gently as he considered the horizon again.

In the far distance the Pillars of Nosgoth burned and crumbled. Brought low by his youthful refusal and the Hylden's careful centuries of work. Soon he would have to act. Without intervention it was likely his younger-self would meet an untimely end. The ominous rumblings of Nosgoth's pain could be felt even in the Citadel. Kain snorted, acknowledging the scope of the disaster. Aftershocks were probably spreading as far away as Meridian. It would take days for the sorry humans there to learn the news of what caused them. The smell of the dust on the wind made the miles between he and the shrine seem negligible.

Kain hesitated, savoring the fullness of the novel sensation of awareness. In the silence of his chest, where his heart had once beat its weary way through the better part of two thousand years, he felt for the first time, that he was beginning to understand what it was all about. Until now it had seemed an incomprehensible tangle; his madness, the constant betrayals and wars, the wounded world. Always before, the 'Wheel of Fate' had been a hypothetical. Kain had fought his destiny ignorant of exactly what he was pitting himself against. He could feel it now, turning along its slow and unalterable axis beneath his feet.

No longer a sleeper walking a preordained path; he felt absolutely and jarringly sensitive to his role in changing the fate of the world. It was Raziel's sacrifice, the purified Reaver, which burned away the fog which had bound him. Kain couldn't help but stare in amazement at the truth of it all. He had become an outsider looking in at the workings of history. His own knowledge and powers amplified by the wisdom of each Balance Guardian before him.

The whole sordid affair of his life, and the events leading to the Pillars' fall, seemed an impossibly thin and implausible plot. He sneered at its lack of imagination even as he acknowledged that the so-called Elder God had almost managed to succeed in its aims.

Raziel's words came back to him with haunting clarity. His true enemy indeed.

The burrowing parasite was a remarkable foe. Attacking the bones of the world from a point that no vampire would have ever dared question, it had poisoned the future to its own ends since before written history. The Ancients were nothing more than willing pawns to the beast that they founded their civilization upon. What was its final goal, Kain wondered. The destruction of the races of Nosgoth? Of Nosgoth itself? He would have to ask the foul thing when next they met. Smirking, Kain conceded that he'd probably forget in the heat of the moment. Tearing the tentacle-armed-horror into palm-sized pieces and scattering it to the winds would take some time however. No doubt it would want to prattle as it died. Having only spoken directly to 'god' twice, he was already certain the creature was the talkative type.

All things considered, he had done fairly well in his half-guessed theories throughout the years. In adding his new player to the board, the truth concerning the Hylden, the Circle of Nine, and particularly Mobius' baffling motivations all became quite blindingly clear. Kain sheathed the Soul Reaver across his shoulders and stretched his arms to work some of the tension loose. It had been a long series of days already, and his labors were still incomplete.

He was meant -he had no doubt- to panic at this point. The false-god's gambit had to involve him flying in haste to defend his younger-self; desperate to avoid of all his efforts of the past two millennium unraveling with his untimely demise as a fledgling. Therefore, haste was the one thing he would not allow himself. He hadn't come this far just to fall into the ageless creature's trap now. Even as weak and ignorant as the Kain of this age would have to be, the vampire would doubtless survive long enough for him to consider his strategy.

Kain took a slow breath and forced himself to prioritize. The Reaver hummed in subdued agreement against his shoulders. Janos would have to be stopped. There was no question. He didn't need the Hylden distraction right now. He had wasted too much time on them already. They had waited a thousand years at this point to exact their revenge. They could damn well wait a little longer without complaining.

There was also the small matter of Vorador's beheading. Probably it was already too late to prevent the uncomfortable incident. Kain frowned, remembering the sight of Mobius holding aloft the old vampire's head just before he struck the Guardian of Time down, the first time.

He shook his head at his youthful gullibility. How long had his pride at that maneuver lasted? How foolish to think that killing a man who was capable of crossing through time at will, would honestly stop his schemes at all. The young Kain currently at risk of being crushed by the Dark Entity would soon know better.

Still, the sooner Vorador's body was reclaimed, the sooner he, or his alter ego, could sort out the arduous task of putting the vampire back together again. The green skinned vampire lord had more than enough dark gift within his blood to walk off a petty thing like a beheading; if his body was reunited with its missing component soon enough.

He laughed at the oddity of fate. No wonder he had been able to restore Vorador to life, even as a mere fledgling all those years ago! The heart beating in his chest had belonged to the green-one's maker all along! It was not the superiority of his magic, as he arrogantly assumed at the time. It was the call of a sire's blood that had healed his old mentor. He had merely been a vessel for a greater power. Tilting his head back so he could feel the brush of the Reaver's hilt against his jaw, Kain acknowledged silently that very little had changed. He was still playing host to… well, at least an equal power. The sword sighed softly, a faint brush of contentment and regret along the edge of his awareness.

Kain wondered if it would be too optimistic to assume things in Avernus would be delayed somewhat by Raziel's handiwork and Mobius' inability to return from the dead. Some damn fool of a Seraphan would eventually put Vorador's various components up on pikes, and begin a cross-country parade back to the strong hold. It would be far easier, and far less aggravating, to intercept the little party before it left the holy city.

Had he been thinking clearer while bantering with the parasite in the caves below, he would have snatched the useless time-streamer's body as he escaped. Maybe gibbeting the corpse along the cathedral's main avenue would have made the foolish mercenaries understand that they would no longer be getting paid to do Mobius' dirty work.

Rubbing his forehead, he wracked his brains for any other events of the present era that he had forgotten. The Second Crusade was ending as he watched, the Third Crusade, and the age of the Seraphim Lord was close now, perhaps already upon them. In the city of Meridian along the south coast, he had no doubt that he could probably see the rise of mechanization. Maybe the Hylden had already begun their power play amongst the theocracy. Black ships were probably beginning to ply their sinister trade between the city and the island stronghold. It would be centuries yet before the Kain of this era walked blindly into that little bit of excitement.

Young Kain would want to set out to raise his first army, heeding Vorador's council and keeping on the move as he crisscrossed the south. How odd to think he'd holed up in Meridian for years on-and-off in his youth without really noticing the Hylden encroaching. Blind stupidity on his part, to be sure, but what was Vorador's excuse? He smirked, making a mental note to harass the vampire later.

Marcus, Sebastian, Faustus, and Magnus would be found first, he recalled. They in turn would fledge other vampires for his army. Vorador would reassemble his family at the same time, raising and training the future leaders of the cabal. Eventually it would all fall to shit after Sebastian's betrayal. But those events were all years in the making. Kain smirked at the memories even as he dismissed them. What he needed was an ally in the present.

As much as he didn't like to admit it, he had been counting on Raziel's assistance in a more ambulatory sense than the child currently was capable of. He picked his way past the rubble of his firstborn's fight with Janos and stepped off the edge of a shattered balcony into thin air. Releasing a breath, Kain willed his body to fragment and swarm as he fell.

There was little time to waste, but Mobius' stronghold wasn't far. He was determined to make the most of his new found freedom of choice.

The forests and villages flashed by beneath him as he bent his will towards the lake-side retreat of the former Guardian. Blues and greens enough to dazzle even his jaded eyes surrounded him as he ducked into valleys and across the lowlands. The soldiers and sycophants of the countryside paid no attention to his silent flight. There were woods and caves enough in the region to justify the unusual phenomena of bats at mid-day. Given the cataclysm in progress at the Pillars' sanctuary, a flock of insomniac bats flitting about was the least of anyone's worries.

Seeing through a colony's-worth of bat eyes was something that one could never exactly adapt to, Kain found. The kaleidoscope of different angles and heights gave him a headache on prolonged flights. There were few faster ways to cross the rugged country around the lakes however, especially in this age. Luckily the target he had in mind was hard to miss.

The sprawling fortress beside the Lake of Tears was an eyesore even from above. He aimed for a convenient balcony and directed the swarm to regroup. Kain landed with cat-like silence despite his mass, hardly waiting until his limbs had fully resolved themselves from the cloud of furry creatures, before crouching below the rail to avoid prying eyes from the adjacent courtyard. The laxity of the Time-Streamer's army was pathetic. Looking first left then right, he couldn't spot a single guardsman. Kain clucked his tongue at the neglect and stood, strolling across the open causeway and to the adjoining terrace with easy familiarity. Mist-shifting through the iron-gate that supposedly kept unwanted visitors away, he strode down the empty hallways of Mobius' inner sanctum.

The sanctuary was unsurprisingly empty, only a few of the mercenary rabble remained behind when their master bid them march on Avernus. Maybe half a brigade remained, mostly gathered in the forecourt and outer bailey as they waited for news of their master. Assorted servants and guardsmen were scattered throughout the buildings. He trusted his nose to find them before the spotted him. Not interested in braking stride for anyone, Kain chose a discrete side-corridor and made good time into the heart of the complex.

In the end, only one mercenary was unfortunate enough to get in his way. Kain snapped the fool's neck before the mortal even realized he was in danger, snacking lightly and then casting the body into an unused salon to continue his stroll. The light snack refreshed, but Kain couldn't really bring himself to enjoy the kill. There was just so much to be done!

One measly hour before the fiend Janos had become would collide fatefully with his younger persona, perhaps less? Kain shook his head at the arbitrary nature of things. He had spent the better part of a thousand years sitting on his hands waiting for his chance to set things right. Waiting for Raziel to do the impossible and return from the lake; waiting for his chance to free his lieutenant from the cycle of history and aid him to defeat Mobius once and for all. Now that the moment had come, every second had become incalculably precious.

He had tossed his theoretical 'coin' and had only himself to blame that events were now irrevocably put into motion. Kain was determined, no matter what sacrifice remained to be made, that everything was in place before it landed. He had already given up more than he had been prepared to offer for his chance at victory. Now he plunged ahead reckless of consequence. He had been counting on Raziel being here to assist! A second pair of hands was imperative at this stage. Sadly, Raziel's were no longer available, so some sort of lesser-substitute would have to be appointed.

Kain felt the beginnings of a headache forming as he realized exactly how much he would be obliged to explain to anyone he took into his confidence. There was the small matter of time streaming to explain. Then there were the multiple paradoxes in the current continuum of time that even he wasn't certain how to resolve. Not to mention a whole charade's worth of vampiric and human political history to be gone through. It would take a year to cover even the barest essentials with a new servant. Assuming of course that whoever he found had half a brain to begin with. He had been grooming Raziel for the better part of a decade, both before his death and after his resurrection. Irregardless of his child's excitable temper; Raziel had at least possessed an above average intellect. Having to start over now, when time was so exasperatingly finite, was infuriating.

Kain bolted the door behind him as he entered Mobius' private workrooms. The heavy wood silenced most of the buzz of the stronghold behind it. He shook his head as the noise faded, dismissing the mercenary army categorically. Even if they weren't simpletons or zealots, they'd be of little use against one as powerful as the Dark Entity. The creature had bent the flow time again and again to reach this moment. It held all the cards. Or at least believed it did. The fact that he was still alive, and relatively whole, was the only thing in his favor. The though naturally lead to another, and Kain smirked at the obviousness of it all. Clearly what he needed was someone more of his own caliber. Really, if you couldn't trust yourself, who could you trust? Two could play at the game of time bending just as easily as one, after all.

Moving quickly down to Mobius' personal time streaming chamber he found a treasure well worth stealing for his own. His youthful lusts for gold and other fineries had died early in his metamorphosis. Even his habit of collecting all manner of written word was more out of the vain hope of someday finding something of use. So what if he never bothered to weed down his collection? It was so difficult to say what would be relevant in the future. A bad book was better than no book, when one had the better part of five centuries to wile away. It was one of few opinions he and Vorador had always shared, despite their generally opposing outlooks.

The book waiting for him on Mobius' workbench nearly made his mouth water with anticipation. The slippery Guardian of Time hadn't had a chance to destroy his fabled notes on the chronoplast in this era. His death truly hadn't been predicted. Had Mobius thought for a minute that Kain was still alive, he'd have thrust the papers into a brazier before going to the Citadel. Kain was surprised Mobius' other-copy hadn't done so either, before going to his death at Avernus. The two must have forgotten to coordinate this time. He grinned widely and scooped up the thick booklet.

It gave Kain a brief feeling of victory to think about the withered old bastard's startled expression once more. The joy in the memory soon paled when he recollected the events immediately after. Raziel! If the child had only listened when he told him to leave Janos well enough alone, things might not have taken quite as unexpected a turn. But who was to say? Perhaps this ordeal was the only way to the future that he sought. He was hardly about to run from a fight now; not after coming so far.

Kain flipped eagerly through the book to check that all pages were intact and then settled to read a section that had not survived into any of the futures he'd had the luxury to live. The notes were considerably longer than he could have ever supposed. And Mobius' chicken-scratchings were no easier to read than in previous years. But still his quick scanning proved fruitful. There were depths to the odd device that no one could have expected to master without the clues provided.

How Mobius had concocted such a fabulously occult machine, he suddenly realized, was a complete mystery. Probably it was the influence of the parasite at the base of the citadel that called itself 'oracle'. Maybe the time traveler's mechanical skill exceeded his psychic talents? Certainly in the end his predictions had left a little to be desired. Kain smirked again at the knowledge the man would no-longer be coming back. It was really for the best. He liked the Guardian of Time better in his current state. Mobius was one of those people Kain found much easier to appreciate when post-mortem.

A flash of light interrupted his diligent perusal even as he was just finding the section he was interested in. For a moment he stared at the chronoplast's doorway, wondering if his irritating enemy had yet again found away around his life-related handicap. Reaching for the Soul Reaver on his shoulder Kain couldn't sense any hostility, overt or otherwise, from across the room. The blade seemed to agree, showing no sign of alarm at the new arrivals. He hesitated a moment longer, but when nothing nasty jumped out to do battle with him, he came to a more entertaining conclusion.

"Kain, I would recommend that you not look. It'll only spoil the surprise."

His own voice, calling out from within the inner chamber, provided all the confirmation he needed. The unmistakable amusement in it was tempting, but he was too entrenched in this mission to risk it on a whim. Glancing down, he smirked as he realized that the reading he was about to embark on required more than a few moments. His future-self must have come to the conclusion that a small overlap in the continuum was required in order to both understand and accomplish what he intended to do. Kain almost laughed, acknowledging that he had become far more reckless over the years. He'd have never dared such a blatant abuse of the time-chamber a century ago.

How often did Mobius meet himself on any given day? He suddenly wondered. No wonder the man hadn't been infected by the Hylden insanity, Mobius had already been uniquely insane.

"It has been less than thirty minutes." He offered the figures standing in the shadows before resolutely turning around to continue his reading while facing the wall.

"If you skip to page 124 you'll save yourself a bit of trouble, I should think." His doppelganger offered smugly as he and another person slipped past. Kain grinned as he flipped ahead past the irrelevant notations. It was supremely amusing to think that he was now in triplicate all within the same space. Present, Future, and probably yesterday-morning, all three Kains bent on one singular purpose. Entertained by the idea of being in multiple places at once, and at the headache he was probably causing the squid lurking beneath the earth, he chuckled aloud as he read.

The cruel joy was short lived. He frowned remembering that not all of his alternate selves were equal. Really, there were four Kains, if he counted the youngest version of himself now about to meet with destiny in the form of the maddened Janos. Four Kains existed, but only two Hearts of Darkness, and one of them beating in its proper place, inside Janos Audron's chest.

The paradox was considerable. It was a damn shame that Moritanius couldn't manage to stay in possession of the Hylden spirit for long enough to let his younger-self kill them both. Clearly he would have to scold Raziel for his lack of forethought should they meet again.

/I don't suppose you can hear me?/ He whispered in his mind. For a moment he was positive that his lieutenant's personality was there, but as soon as a connection was made, he found he couldn't hold onto it. Raziel was at his shoulder, and also far out of his reach.

/Well far be it from me to say 'I told you so', child. But really, Janos Audron? You're going to make the fool of a vampire that I was in this time fight Janos Audron, father of vampires?/

The sword, for lack of a better word, twitched suspiciously. Knowing his son the way he knew few others in the world, he could read the emanation as if the thought had been spoken aloud.

_You mean there was a time when you weren't invincible?_

/I don't recall you having much success in containing the man here./ He grumbled back at the blade, quickly scanning through the text where he left off.

--

Closing the notebook with a sigh, Kain rubbed his face, trying to internalize everything he had gleaned from Mobius' chicken-scratch handwriting. It was as he had always suspected. The time streaming chambers could do far more than simply shuttle a person from one point to the next like a glorified warp-gate. It could also be used to search for specific people, events, potentialities. No wonder Mobius always had just the right edge, the right information, whenever he needed it. He could simply search the entire continuum of time for whatever it was that he was in the mood for and scoop it up; and to hell with maintaining any sort of reasonable causality. And now he, Kain, was reaping the whirlwind that the mad guardian had created. He considered his options as he set the book aside.

According to the text if he was to have any luck, he would have to confine his search to something or someone very singular, and preferably powerful. For a moment he was certain he could simply search for himself. It was the ideal answer to his needs, but only if the chamber understood that what he wanted wasn't his present self but one from a different time frame. How many times had he stood in this chamber, past and present, fiddling with the confounded device? All he would have to do is find an amenable version of himself from, say, yesterday-morning and he would be more than satisfied. Surely, his alternate self would need some convincing, however he felt he was more than up to the task of justifying his request. So long as the version of himself he encountered wasn't a total prat he wouldn't have any problem.

Resolutely he promised himself to narrow his search down to those Kains reasonably similar in age to himself. He wasn't entirely sure if the versions from more than a century before would suit his needs. He winced. It was hard to admit one was formerly an arrogant idiot, even in the privacy of ones own mind.

So the trick was to narrow the parameters of the search somewhat. A recent Kain would be in possession of a Raziel-enhanced Soul Reaver. That was the easiest distinguishing mark he might search by. He drew the weapon and looked it over. To the naked eye it looked much as it always had, but this blade was not the one he had carried through his own dark future. That one had been shattered against Raziel's wraith, as part of the cycle of events that brought them both back to the past. This blade came from their clash a hundred years prior when he had prevented Raziel from being engulfed. He snorted in cynical amusement. Stopping his erstwhile child hadn't done much good. A hundred years later they met only for his lieutenant to fling himself selflessly into the doom he had been bitching about avoiding in their previous encounter.

He shrugged at the mystery of it all as the blade in his hand glowed softly. Raziel's moods and motivations were inexplicable most days. He smirked, acknowledging that they were truly a pair in that sense as well as in most other ways.

Wasting no further time in placing the sword across the poles of the machine as the instructions had guided. He specified the constraints he was looking for and then engaged the device by grabbing onto the control armature.

"Find me one wielding the Balance Reaver's power!" He snarled against the tingling burn of the magic coursing through his arms.

The sword flickered and glowed where it lay across the machine's interface, its aura reacting to the enchantment being woven around it. "Forgive me, child." Kain spared a thought towards the evil looking blade. "It's not that your sacrifice was a vain one. Indeed I believe all pivots upon it. But for the upcoming labors, I require an ally with a pair of arms and legs, as well as the cleansed soul you so thoughtfully provided me."

. Hundreds of thousands of gears and cambers in the walls and floors began to move, their modest labors building into a rushing symphony of motion and sound, discretely tucked out of sight. To what purpose their motions, Kain could only guess. Sympathatic vibrations? Temporal resonance? He had long ago learned the vocabulary of Mobius' unique craft, but the underlying theory was still a mystery, and likely always would be. Power built in the crystalline focus at the heart of the room, a smaller portion gathering in the armature beneath his claws, and he felt in his spine the instant that the true magic began.

The room's colors bled and ran like wet ink as time bent and folded in on itself. Everything becoming vague and half-formed other than whomever stood within the central field of the machine's orbit. Would-have, should-have, could-have beens flickered at the edge of his vision. The very walls around him bent and buckled, aged a thousand years, then restored themselves to gleaming newness, then faded completely. Kain had long-ago taught himself to ignore the phenomena. Practice had made the process rather mundane over the years, if no less strange looking.

He vastly preferred the larger time-chamber to the north, it was more spacious than the little closets Mobius had constructed across Nosgoth. Kain rather enjoyed the spectacle of watching the gateway coalesce against the wall of the room; more so then feeling of the passage opening up under his feet. It allowed a person time for second thoughts, before leaping into the unknown. Mobius' other toys didn't really provide the option. Kain didn't consider himself particularly fearful of enclosed spaces, but the streaming-chamber in the citadel made him uncomfortable. For a long moment there was nothing but the silent rushing of dim light around him, the streaming chamber seemingly hung in between seconds as it searched through all of probability.

His previous jumps through time had all been fairly brief and abrupt affairs. Kain frowned as the seconds seemed to trickle by with still no resolution. Arcs of magic stung his fingers as he held on to the machine, not liking the idea of being bucked free of the malfunctioning contraption and left hanging in limbo. Then again there was the very real possibility that he had asked too much of the machine, and stupidly just clipped himself out of reality altogether. There was nothing particularly he could do either way. The small chronometer on the dial spun in random ways, sometimes forward sometimes back, blindly looking through time.

Kain watched it, wondering why it was working so hard when the sick realization hit him. He had asked for the impossible. As often as he or Raziel had been near or in this chamber in the past, both of them wielding the Soul Reaver; neither of them had been holding this particular Reaver blade. The pure and untainted heart of the weapon was going to be his search's undoing. It had never existed in Mobius' fortress, or this chamber, before his arrival minutes before. Creating a paradox of that magnitude was stretching things a little too far for his comfort.

He hissed in dismay, and tried to let go of the grips. If Mobius' notes could be trusted, he would either stop the process and return to when he had begun, or he would be obliged to escape the safety of the field and let the time stream throw him where it would. Kain cursed himself for not spending more time on his initial request to the machine, probably there had been a better way to configure his intention before the search had begun.

To his surprise and relief, the machine had already settled on a destination. There would be no need for further stupidity, for now at least. He frowned again as the room grew darker even than customary in Mobius' dank outer chambers.

Not the past then. Surely, it was a point in the future?

He released the grips and paced to the doorway, darkness more penetrable as his eyes adjusted. The room was in complete disrepair. More so than in his own far-flung future, the place looked abandoned. Enormous cracks ran through the ancient tile work on the floor. The murals on the walls, still Vorador's beheading he noted with amusement, were nigh blanketed with the filth of eons. Which ever era he had found, this particular chamber wasn't frequented by the people living in it.

Kain's nose twitched as the smell of damp and mildew came to him. The fortress had always been beside a lake, but in the future water levels had risen considerably. Still, he didn't remember this section of the fortress getting submerged. Until he discovered more about the era he had been dumped into, he didn't dare make assumptions. He wasn't eager to be caught in a sudden deluge. Kain glanced over the dials of the time machine once more, trying to determine what age he had been dropped into. Due to the vague nature of his request, he hadn't set an explicit date, and so the machine could tell him next to nothing. Snarling at the uselessness of it all, he realized the only way to be sure would be to go out and check.

Cautious of the fragile architecture, he stepped out into the room, hesitant to leave the time chamber behind. From the fractured and crumbling look of the ceiling, the whole place could cave in at any minute. Dust and gravel trickled out of cracks in the walls like tiny waterfalls. In several sections tree roots as thick as his arms had burrowed through the destroyed masonry and wound their way from ceiling to floor, continuing their quest downwards towards the soil. Kain heard the drip of water towards one corner of the room. The muffled noises from above included the distant call of songbirds. He paused, recognizing the wholesome sound. That at least proved this age was not his own lost empire. Only carrion birds had managed to profit by the land's gradual collapse, and even those had become scrawny, bitter sounding creatures.

Underfoot was mostly dust and tatters, nothing big enough was left to be recognizable. Someone had probably stripped the room bare of anything useful an eon ago. All that was left was rotted flora and a few scattered bits of trash. Kain nudged the rusted remains of a large candelabrum with his foot. Bits of its decorative flourishes broke off and clattered to the floor. He sighed and shook his head; tasteless overwrought junk, like most of Mobius' décor. Moving to the other corner of the room he toed some interesting looking mounds of what might have once been books, but was more likely just old leaves. The dusty cloud his nudge created tickled his nose, forcing a sneeze. Kain rubbed his face and stepped away from the irritant.

Looking around the rest of the room proved more of the same. Mostly it was just dirt, rubbish, and fallen rock. A gentle tremor made the hair on the back of his neck stand up. Dirt sifted down from the ceiling, but blessedly, the structure held. He retreated back into the relatively safety of the time-streaming device to consider his options.

A mistake must have been made. There was no Kain here. Not unless he was ground to dust ages ago and now unidentifiable amidst all the other filth on the floors. He almost laughed at the morbid idea. The question remained, what was he to do?

The damnable machine had brought him here for a reason. One last prank from a dead time-guardian? He found it hard to believe. Clearly the timelines had converged on this moment in response to his search. So where was the Reaver? Had he left it in this hole for some inexplicable reason?

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of footsteps above him. Despite the ludicrous danger of wandering in the crumbling building, someone else seemed to be at large. For a moment Kain was tempted to go and seek the stranger, but his sharp ears detected the man's direction. Whoever it was, they were coming to see him. Smiling at the games fate played, he held his position, content to wait. The scratching 'click' of each footstep puzzled him as he heard his visitor turn the necessary corner and descend the stairs. Not boots, surely. Nor armor. Talon? He smiled slowly. Talon. His host would be a vampire it seemed. Feeling renewed satisfaction in Mobius' time machine, he patted it almost paternally. It had done its job after all, if not quite as anticipated. He began to frame arguments suitable for his own intellect. If he was to meet himself, he could probably cut to the chase fairly quickly, but still it didn't hurt to be prepared.

"Is there someone below?"

He couldn't help but hiss, taken aback by the question in the darkness. A tingle of shock tickled down his spine. That voice? He looked towards the broken doorframe on the far side of the room. The sudden gleam torchlight danced crazily along the shattered flagstones and between the rotted timbers.

He might be stunned, but the vampire approaching was ignorant of it. "This structure is highly volatile! And even if it were not; access is forbidden by order of the Last Scion. Show yourselves without delay!"

The idea of a 'Last Scion' was briefly distracting but not enough to shift his attention fully away from the man approaching.

"Who are you, to order me about?" He called back, already certain he knew who it was.

Raziel. Of course it would be Raziel. He had sought the Reaver, had he not? He shook his head at the obviousness of it. The time-streaming device had done exactly as asked, in its way. It had brought him to a point in time where his 'Reaver' could be found. Kain felt the urge to laugh, first at his own stupidity, and then at the shock this alternate-Raziel was about to get. Would the vampire know him, he wondered? How could he not. They were eternally bound together. Friends or enemies, it mattered not. Either aligned or opposing, they were always a pair.

"I am a servant of the Scion, stranger. And you are trespassing on holy ground." Shouldering the remains of the door aside, and cringing at the renewed cascade of grit from above, Kain's visitor warily held his torch aloft, peering at the ceiling in dismay. "Truly, this is a ridiculously dangerous bolt-hole, sir. Come with me now to higher ground and explain yourself, and I may turn a blind eye to your odd little adventure."

He almost chuckled at the so-familiar tone of the scold. How many times had he heard his firstborn use just such cajoling tone with one of his younger lieutenants? But those days were long past, not to mention in a future that would likely never come to pass. Still, he couldn't help but address his visitor with his old customary way. "Raziel. Don't be unforgivably simple. If I am here, surely it is for good reason."

The shock his companion suffered was perfectly apparent. Still holding the torch outstretched, his once and future subordinate-now-sword stared at him in absolute amazement.

--

"Kain?"

Forgetting himself, the dark-haired man strode closer, forgetting his earlier concerns for the failing structure. "Lord Scion? But how can this be when I only left you a few hours past. You didn't pass by me, I would have seen it! And your f- your clothes!"

Kain almost laughed at the alarmed catch in the vampire's voice. Self censorship had never been Raziel's strongest skill. He had no doubt what it was the vampire had meant to say. He wondered how different looking this era's Kain had to be to prompt such an honest if impolitic criticism of his profile. Close enough that their inspection could now be mutual, they both paused to assess.

There were certainly points of incongruity in his lieutenant's dress; his manner as well. The fact that Raziel was a fully evolved vampire helped him roughly estimate the century. But his costume, halfway between knight and priest was a bit puzzling. The red of Raziel's clan-crest had taken on a less ruddy, cleaner hue, his symbol more artistic, but it was without a doubt of the same general design. His face was much the same, as handsome as he ever was. It was almost painful to see him whole and beautiful again, knowing his ruined destiny.

If not for one particular defect, he would have easily mistaken this future for a close twin of his own. Changes of fashion were superficial, and didn't mean anything. The fact that this vampire was more conservative in dress and speech then his own lost-child meant nothing. The twin arches of smoky grey rose above each of Raziel's shoulders before plunging down out of sight behind the man's back however were completely outside of his ability to predict. Kain's nose told him as surely as his eyes did, that the enormous appendages were no more and no less than a pair of feathery wings, large as life.

Kain wondered what it meant, for surely this did not tally with his memories. This Raziel's evolution had clearly followed along a classical trend. Rather than bat-like or Hylden styled, his wings were things of wonder. Powerful ropes of muscle were disguised by the soft looking down of feathers. These wings were meant for far more than mere gliding. They looked sturdy enough to launch Raziel into flight from a standing start. If anything, they were most similar to the wings portrayed in the murals of the ancients, saving that their color made the vampire look more like a sculpture than a proper ancient. Rather than the clean elegant black of the paintings, these were a sooty dappled shade. The easy grace with which the vampire wore his extra limbs implied they were not a new development. There had been no punishment meted out for early evolution, for this Raziel.

Kain tore his eyes away from their curious inspection before his amazement became apparent. Was Raziel's evolution accelerated then? Had it been expected? Did all vampires now have wings? Or had he arrived absurdly late, and somehow this era's Kain had spared his son?

It was clear that Raziel wasn't as well pleased with what he found. The vampire's yellow eyes strayed over Kain's clan shroud, his face, armored greaves, and back to his face again, with obvious alarm. Kain couldn't help but wonder what in particular about his appearance didn't tally compared to the other Kain, the one who belonged in this time. Was his alternate version more handsome? It was hardly possible to be less. Perhaps he too had wings now; there was an amusing thought. He almost laughed at the absurd idea. It was impossible to say without direct study, but clearly something was amiss. His subordinate recognized him on instinct, but when presented with the blatant change from expected, was clearly dismayed.

If there was a Lord Scion, it seemed to imply that this particular continuum was of a sort Kain had never before encountered. A future where he was Balance Guardian? Did that mean he had won? The fact that he had found this timeline at all meant that his Raziel's gift truly had been the key to unraveling fate. Never before had he found a way to go forward into a future not wracked with ruin and corruption. Surely this was the future he was hoping to bring about? His infant hope grew a further notch.

"What is the year?" Kain asked abruptly, needing confirmation.

"What ever do you mean?" His new Raziel blinked in confusion, pulling back slightly.

"Don't question. Just answer plainly. What is the exact date?"

"It is the turn of the year, Lord. Today is the first day of the first month of the1005th year since Empire's founding. As you well know." The dark haired man frowned again, struggling to make sense of their meeting.

"You're supposed to be attending the ceremonies to celebrate your ascension at the capital. How on earth did you come to be here of all places... and your appearance..."

"Enough." Kain dismissed the ramblings with a curt gesture. "When did I decide to do a damn-fool thing like re-number the calendar?!"

Raziel's confusion grew. "It has been popularly accepted since I was a mere fledgling, lord. I couldn't say when precisely the old calendar was dismissed entirely, but the only ones who use it now are scholars who specialize in the ancients."

"I don't suppose you know the date by the old calendar?" Kain rubbed his face, feeling his age.

"Not off hand, no. But it wouldn't be impossible to calculate. Since the origin of the new calendar is well known."

Kain stared at the handsome vampire a full minute before coming to the conclusion that the man had no comprehension of his rising frustration. "... AND?"

"Sire?" His lieutenant cringed in an unbecoming way.

"The date, Raziel. The date? Do try to keep up."

"Is this some sort of odd test, lord?" A deep rumble beneath their feet caused them both to cringe and look upwards at the precarious cracks in the masonry for a moment. "If it is, can we kindly have it somewhere more hospitable?"

"Come this way." Kain brooked no hesitation, catching the front of Raziel's red surcoat and walking briskly backwards until they were within the relative safety of the time streaming chamber. "Now. Quickly. What is the basis of the new calendar."

"Your ascension, lord scion. The day that you claimed your birthright as the Guardian of the Pillar of Balance and wielded the ancient sword, Soul Reaver, in order to defeat the Hylden challenger and banish their kind to oblivion for all time?"

"I see." Kain let go of his lieutenant's coat in order to crouch on the floor. Other than Mobius' notes, there was no scrap of paper to do the notation on, and no ink even if less valuable parchment was available. He had sharp claws however, and the weathered floor was easy enough to scratch. Quickly doing out the math, he raised an eyebrow at the result. This future was easily as far along as his own had been before he had started the whole process off by murdering his second-in-command. He glanced up appreciatively at the vampire next to him, wondering what the odds were that this Raziel would suffer the same fate.

The potential headaches of causality if Raziel was late to his own execution truly staggered the mind. But would such an event even be necessary, in this perfected future? If he was able to return the vampire to this moment when all was resolved, no one -saving his lieutenant- would ever be the wiser.

Cut out from the wheel of fate as he was, he found that he stood wholly unaffected by this parallel future. Try as he might, he could summon no memory of living in a pristine Nosgoth with Raziel as his priest and son at his side. The Kain of this world was wholly separate from his own consciousness. The experience was both new and unpleasant. There would be no cheating from this point on, he realized. He had to first make the new future, before he could experience it.

His choices were limited. He would either accept what the time machine had found for him, or push the man back into the collapsing stronghold and set the instrument to searching again with no guarantee that there was anything else to find. Suddenly he understood his future-self's amusement back in the chronoplast chamber. Spoil the surprise? To have Raziel back in the flesh mere hours after his investiture into the Reaver's blade? No wonder he had sounded so smug.

His considering stare didn't go unnoted. Raziel backed away nervously. "Something in all of this isn't right. You act like my lord, and you certainly sound like him... But you aren't, are you...? This is some sort of trickery."

"Stay where you are, child. I haven't dismissed you yet." He stood slowly, "As it turns out, no, I am not the man who you say is currently celebrating the anniversary of his victory. But never-the-less, I am Kain. Your lord and master. And as such, you will at least do me the courtesy of hearing my request."

"I kneel to only one man." Raziel's eyes narrowed. "The redeemer of this wounded world! The righteous and noble king of all the tribes of Nosgoth! I do not submit my will to just any piratical pretender who slanders the word of the divine with his own petty demands."

Kain blinked at the outraged declaration and fought hard not to smile at the improbability of being seen as both noble and righteous; especially by Raziel of all people. Quickly on the heels of the thought was a pang of reminiscence. His firstborn had always had a natural aptitude for overblown-if-inspiring speeches. During the founding of his empire, he had exploited the skill ruthlessly. Still, it was hardly productive now.

"Are you quite finished?"

"No!" The vampire chose an awkward moment to grow a spine. He had the audacity to grab a hold of Kain's cape, and made to drag him bodily from the room. Not for the first time Kain was reminded that his eldest son was almost of a height with him when not inclined to slouch.

It didn't mean his ungrateful offspring could ever match him fairly, but it amused him a moment to realize he could meet the irritated gaze full on. To his even greater amusement, Raziel flinched and looked away, chastised. That at least was something new.

Even when still playing the roles of obedient son and dutiful king with each other, he had taught his second early on how to curb any irksome submissive tendencies. Vampires didn't grovel, even before their master. Genuflection was given by action, with the firm understanding that even the slightest of a vampire's acknowledgements was by its very nature, a humbling gesture. Clearly the Kain from this timeline hadn't bothered with such a concept. Having only exchanged two minutes of conversation with Raziel, he already felt the difference. This was not the wasp-tongued critic and assured commander he was used to bantering with, but an entirely tamer creature.

The ground shook again, this time dislodging several chunks of the walls around them. Kain rolled his eyes at the need for a blatant lie. "Very well, I'll go with you, but first let me turn off this machine. I do not want it still active if this molehill decides to collapse after we've left." Sure enough Raziel, as the law-abiding officer he seemed to be, honored his request by letting go of his arm.

"Hurry then. I have no wish to tarry here."

Kain smirked and turned to quickly re-adjust the device's various gears. A return to the past was strongly recommended before Mobius' crumbling fortress did its swansong right on top of them. A judicious offset in the number of minutes and he risked the small overlap in time needed to keep to his tight schedule. He shook his head at the insanity of it all.

Raziel watched in cautious wonder. "What is this place?" I once explored these ruins as a fledgling from basement to tower roof and never noticed this room before."

"It's easy enough to overlook, for those who don't know to search for it." Kain agreed calmly, sheathing the Soul Reaver across his shoulders, his need for it done for the moment. He grabbed the poles of the machine to activate it. "It's a time machine, as it turns out. A remarkable toy created by a madman, which I have been availing myself for a few centuries now. After all, what better way to gain perspective on the past, than to relive it?"

"What?!" Raziel moved to flee but it was already too late. The characteristic flickering light that defined the manipulation of time surrounded them and prevented the vampire from anything too foolish.

"What have you done?" His lieutenant crouched on the floor as if leery of losing his balance as reality shifted around them. Kain simply bared his teeth in wicked pleasure.

The process was over almost as soon as it began, reality reasserting itself with a familiar lurch. Kain could hear the shouting and hurried footsteps of the Seraphan mercenaries on the floors above, reassuring himself that he was in the correct time again. "Come, I'll explain as we go."

"Go where?" The dark haired vampire looked around in bafflement. "Why have you abducted me?"

"I need your assistance with a small matter." Suddenly remembering his audience outside the chamber, he halted Raziel's progress at the door. "Wait." He murmured softly and then called out to the Kain on the other side of the room. "Kain, I would recommend that you not look." He couldn't help but shake his head at the hypocrisy of what he was about to say. "It'll only spoil the surprise."

It was supremely strange to watch himself turn his back, politely refusing to acknowledge the time distortion that their meeting must cause. "It has been less than thirty minutes."

His earlier-self reminded him, quite helpfully, really.

Kain adjusted his frame of reference back to the current present with a nod. He gestured to Raziel to remain perfectly silent, and then lead the astounded vampire from the room. Turning back, he took pity on his past self. "If you skip to page 124 you'll save yourself a bit of trouble, I should think."

Carefully closing the door behind them Kain hushed Raziel a second time as the man went to ask a question, and then led him to the closest unguarded balcony. "Are those wings just for show? Or do you have some capacity for flight?" He glanced over at the startled vampire.

Engrossed by the scenery, Raziel paused in confusion at his question. "Of course I can fly. What good would wings be if they were merely decorations?"

Kain remembered the ruined drape of the wraith Raziel's tattered wings and looked away, conscience gnawing at him. "What use indeed." Thinking on past mistakes didn't do anything to correct the current situation however. "Follow me then, if you can. To the Vampire Citadel if you know the place."

"I do." Raziel's frowning face became a confusing mosaic as Kain willed himself to transform.

Looking back to see if the vampire was able to keep up was impossible without losing control of the swarm's direction. He cursed the way his attention was fragmented amongst a colony of spectral bats, but the shadow on the ground just behind Kain implied his replacement-child was characteristically only a pace behind. Cutting across the valley, he took the shortest route possible to return to the citadel. With any luck, by the time he got there, he'd have some idea of what he would do about Audron.

--

Rematerializing as his lieutenant gracefully landed, Kain could still easily see Janos in the distance. They had made excellent time, thanks to his minor time bending. The possessed vampire was still aloft, gliding around the broken remains of the Pillars, seeking to confront his earlier self. Turning to see if the reality of the situation had yet to sink in for his companion, he gestured to the view. "Now. We need to talk."

"By the grace of the ancients." Raziel swore like the priest he had once been. His grey wings fluffed and shifted with his amazement. "The Pillars are broken? But they were healed over millennia ago…"

"One thousand years, plus-or-minus five." Kain shrugged. "Today is the day of their fall. And hopefully the day of their rebirth. Today is the day when Kain claims his destiny as the Scion of Balance and changes the fate of the world."

"Today?!" The vampire spun and stared at him in horror.

"Listen to me Raziel, we don't have terribly much time and it appears, unfortunately, you have no memories of these events."

"I shouldn't think I have even been born yet." The vampire pointed out absently, eyes drawn back to the distant Pillars.

"Born, lived, slain, interred, but not yet resurrected." Kain couldn't help but be distracted by the memory. "It will be some years yet before I go looking for you and your brothers."

"Rahab would give his left arm to see this." Raziel murmured.

Attention naturally bending to the ruined Pillars in the distance, Kain sought and found Janos, still circling. Clearly the creature possessing the ancient vampire still hadn't spotted what it was looking for.

He wracked his memory to try and recall exactly what his first moves on emerging from his decision at the portals had been. It was such a long time ago! How ironic to be staring at the events as they unfolded and not be able to remember such a trivial detail. He knew what he eventually did, but his immediate goals at the time were a mystery. Probably sought shelter from the falling debris and brigands somewhere to wait until nightfall? It seemed a reasonable thing to do. Even in his former stupidity, he had been a careful creature. Hopefully it wasn't too much to ask that his younger self had sought a convenient bolt-hole.

Turning to his companion, he spared a second to admire the vampire's profile. For certainly vampire he still was, despite his knightly trappings. Something in Raziel's nature gave it away, more than just the characteristic hunger. There was the super-human ability to observe with clarity coupled with curiosity in his firstborn's stare. "Welcome to history, child." He couldn't help but say.

Raziel met his eyes with a look that spoke of dawning comprehension of their situation. "You are not my Kain. Nor are you this Kain… But, somehow, you are another Kain?"

"Perhaps the only Kain." He shrugged. "The only one who matters, for the moment." Shaking his head, he dismissed the incongruity of existing in a future he could not remember. "You were told about the Pillars, surely. The Nine Guardians? Their eventual corruption and my own origin at Moritanius' hands?"

"I know some of it." Raziel hedged. "You did not like talking about your past."

"Did I tell you about the Hylden? About the Elder God?" He couldn't help growling a bit over the creature's self-aggrandizing name.

"The Hylden were our race's enemies, long ago defeated foes. I fought at your side against their sympathizers during the dawn of the Empire." His lieutenant frowned at the memory. "Of this 'god' you speak of, no, I know nothing of it."

"Interesting." Kain filed the information away for further inquiries later. "And how about the eternal Janos Audron? And that sour old bastard, Vorador? What do you know of them?"

"Janos Audron was the Father of Vampires, who was resurrected to become a pawn of the Hylden, the Dark Entity. You slew him and then redeemed the Pillars to the greater glory of Nosgoth…" Raziel's words trailed off at Kain's ironic glance. Setting what had to be memorized genuflection aside the vampire settled his hands into the pockets of his outer coat and shrugged.

"Of Vorador, I know only a little. He was an ally of yours in the Second Crusade who died at the start of the Third, shortly before you resurrected us. Apparently he sought to betray you to your enemies."

"Very well." Kain thought a moment about how to rearrange the actual events in a way more palatable to his new ally. Several of the vampire's comments didn't tally with the future as he had seen it, but there was no time for a discussion comparative history.

"In the distance, if you look, you will see the possessed Janos Audron hovering over the Pillars. He is even now hunting for Kain, not myself but rather the Kain of this age. However this Kain has no foreknowledge as yet of his fate to be the redeemer of the world. If he were to accidentally go to war with Audron as he is now, it would almost certainly be his death. I need to get to Kain, instruct him in his higher purpose, and equip him with this."

He drew forth the Soul Reaver, once again flickering with phantom fire at the idea of going into battle against the Hylden. Raziel drew back in judicious caution. Kain smirked at his lieutenant's discomfort, knowing full well that if the vampire knew the real reason for his sword's power, he would be horrified beyond measure. He pushed on with his narrative instead. "What I need from you is merely this. A distraction."

"A distraction." His firstborn gave him a look that clearly implied several slanders against his sanity. Looking first at the horizon, and then back at his maker, Raziel gestured weakly. "You want me to take on the Adversary."

"So that I can prepare Kain for his battle. Yes." Kain nodded firmly.

His lieutenant continued to stare at him. "You're in earnest."

"Do I look to be otherwise?" Kain raised an eyebrow. "I have given you an order, child. Do not defy me."

"But it's the Adversary!" Raziel's composure broke as he pointed energetically. "Only the Scion can defeat him, all the histories were in definite agreement on that account! He had the strength of a titan and his every breath brought pestilence and horror to the land!"

"I'm not asking you to defeat him." Kain explained with brittle patience. "Just run him off for a bit, keep him busy. You ought to be more than up to the task. I have a suspicion most of what you've been taught is a trifle embellished."

"And you promise Kain will come along and aid me in due course?" His lieutenant's incredulity faded but his expression wasn't entirely convinced.

"Of course." Kain smirked. "That is, after all, what is written in history."

Raziel grumbled as he checked that his sword was loose in its scabbard. Glancing around the room, he claimed a serviceable looking spear from the nearest armored display as well. Tossing it from hand to the other to test its weight, he grimaced and walked to the edge of the broken section of balcony. "The histories never said anything about the Scion needing me to come along and save him…"

"They never do." Kain agreed under his breath. Shielding his eyes with a hand as his ally erupted skyward with a huge beat of his oversized wings, Kain sighed in pleasure at the sight. For a moment he stood watching, quietly proud for his child. Staring at moldering old murals of ancient vampires over the centuries had not prepared him for the simple splendor of watching one in flight. Smoke colored feathers shook loose with Raziel's initial zeal to be in the air, each floating back to earth with weightless ease. The vampire held neither fear of sunlight nor the dizzying drop below him; as confident in the air as on foot, perhaps more so. Moving ever higher and faster, Raziel spread his wings wide and used the winds that rose over the cliffs to gain altitude with which to stalk his unwanted prey.

Kain was sorely tempted to stand back and watch the ensuing aerial battle, confident that its like hadn't been seen in Nosgoth's skies in over a thousand years. But sadly there were other appointments to keep. He would simply have to trust that Raziel's stubborn courage was up to the task at hand. Clearing his thoughts of any distractions, he willed his body to transform into the swarm; consciousness shattering in a dozen directions as he winged his way across country towards the Pillars. If his hunch was correct, and he sorely hoped it was, then he would find his earlier self in the cave system nearest the Pillars, replenishing himself in the shady grottos for the long trek to Avernus Cathedral where Vorador might yet be resurrected.

--

--


	2. Chapter 2

Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King

(A continuation fan-fiction for Legacy of Kain: Defiance)

/../- implies vampiric 'whisper' a.k.a. telepathy/mental projection.

The Soul Reaver isn't capable of speech as such, but I gave it dialog anyway to show that Kain can interpret its wordless snark without difficulty? I have no idea. Just go with it.

**The End: Chapter 2-**

The neglected highway and woods surrounding the cave of the blood shrine were hauntingly familiar, as were most things of this era. Kain mused on the circular nature of life even as he checked himself over for any signs of mischance that had occurred during his bat flight across country.

Overhead he could hear the whistle and crash of Hash'a'gik's magic as the creature defended itself from an unexpected attack from above. Twin screams of pain and rage boded well for Raziel's distraction. Both of them sounded as though they were more involved with tearing at each other than anything going on below the tree line. Keeping to the shadows of the forest, Kain picked his way along the bluff parallel to the wagon furrowed road and then jumped down the steep hillside to where a rocky outcropping revealed a deeper shadow than the others.

Ducking within the promising darkness, Kain took a breath and smiled at the welcoming aroma. The cave's air was thick with the clean sweet smell of fresh blood. The ancient fountains - eternally welling with their primal drink - still flowed and bubbled in this timeline. Mobius must have been too busy dealing with his and Raziel's antics to remember to dispatch his Seraphan armies out to sabotage and bury the unwanted watering holes of the ancients.

It wasn't true blood, Kain was nearly positive, but something that Janos' tribe had wrought immediately following their curse. They created a way to feed without harming any living creature, deriving the much needed sustenance from the very heart of Nosgoth itself. It was a point of debate, whether it was more or less parasitic to draw life from the earth directly, or from the other creatures that lived upon it. But Kain supposed that at the time, the ancient vampires were content with anything that would both feed them and postpone their eventual moral quandary.

He stepped further into the comforting darkness, eyes adjusting readily to the low red glow of the decorative carved skulls atop the fountain's central column. With the shadowy quiet came fatigue. Kain felt every tendon in his neck and shoulders as he unconsciously relaxed a little. Rubbing at a particularly sore spot, he sighed and acknowledged that immortal or not, invincible or not, he wanted nothing more than to sit down awhile. Even half an hour would do. He hadn't stopped moving since breaking free from the Hylden realm, and his time lying there hadn't felt particularly restful. His chest still ached with the memory.

Bracing his hands against the edge of the fountain, he tried to rest a moment before his next ordeal. He didn't imagine trying to reason with the Kain of this age was going to be at all easy. The urge to rub at the thick mass of scars on his chest, re-opened then healed so recently only reminded him of his own long forgotten origins. It was something he and the young one would have in common at least. They had both lately walked-off a fatal impaling. The boy had transformed from man to vampire with that fateful stroke. Where as he had turned from vampire to… something else.

/ I hope you enjoyed that, by the way. / He commented sarcastically to his sword.

_Enjoyed what?_ The Reaver buzzed, attentive but not helpful.

/ Taking my damned heart out with your bare claws? Was that truly necessary? / Kain projected towards the weapon, trying to enunciate as if speaking across a long distance. He had no idea if it was helpful to the being in the sword or not, but it seemed a little concentration made their piecemeal discussions slightly easier. He felt a blossom of complex impressions from the blade almost immediately in response.

_It wasn't yours in the first place. _

The uncharitable meaning was clear. He would be getting no sympathy from that direction. He couldn't say he was surprised.

Kain sighed and left it at that. There was no reasoning with Raziel before, when he was feeling self-righteous. Now that he was a sword, there was little difference. Besides, arguing with the sword was doubly frustrating when he was obliged to puzzle out every rebuttal. It completely ruined the easy rhythm of their old squabbles. That thought brought him back to the present.

He could smell the other vampire in the cavern. And the youth had undoubtedly noted his arrival by now. Kain waited, curious to see how the fledgling would react.

"Who goes there?! Who dares disturb my solitude?!" A voice commanded him from the darkness on the other side of the ornate fountainhead.

Kain fought the urge to draw the Reaver at the autocratic tone. He remembered enough of his youth to suppose that the young vampire crouched across from him would take it personally if he drew steel. Instead he stooped to the fountain, filling his cupped palms with the blood and quietly refreshing himself for the upcoming argument.

In the shadows in front of him he could easily make out the sounds of the other vampire jumping down from a ledge and stalking closer. The slip and shuffle of gravel beneath booted feet made Kain smile into his drink. In this age, he still was human enough to have fingers and toes. How long had it been since he had need of something as common as boots? What had ever happened to his collection of ridiculous armor?

The fledgling was not inclined to be patient with his wool-gathering. "Name yourself, stranger."

The damn fool, had of course, drawn his own weapon. Kain glanced up at last, and received his first nasty shock. The blade his alter ego wielded was not the Soul Reaver, but rather the flaming brand of a blade he had favored during the first half of the quest he had undertaken for Ariel's ghost.

Hooked into the fledgling's belt were the matched pair of axes he had also loved once, but of the Reaver there was no sign. For a moment Kain panicked, and then the blade resting against his spine pulsed, aura heavy with irony, to remind him of its presence.

Of course the youth didn't have the Reaver. He did.

From the moment years ago when he had deflected Raziel's attack in front of William the Just's tomb, it had been in either his, or his lieutenant's possession continuously. His fledgling-self would have never been able to take it up for the simple reason that it hadn't been there to be taken. Had he died as he was supposed to, his sword would have returned to its resting place, ready at hand for its 'new' master. But Raziel had spared him, and in the ensuing chaos, the timeline had compensated as best it could. Instead, the young vampire seemed to have defeated his final foes handily with the lesser weapons of the era. That at least was a small blessing.

Feeling the mounting paradoxes, Kain resisted the urge to rub his forehead. What in the hell would this change do to affect the outcome of his duel with William the Just? Had the duel even taken place? Did it even matter anymore, was the real question. Kain couldn't begin to hazard a guess. His own memories remained unchanged, so somehow it seemed everything would work out as it had once done, but he couldn't see how it was possible. Best to plow forward and save the worrying for a moment when he wasn't being held at sword point, he decided.

The tip of the flaming blade pricked at his shoulder as he lowered his hands, letting the last of the blood drip off his claws and back into the pool. The implied threat provided by his former self caused his own blade to murmur menacingly. But seeming to understand that subtly was required, Raziel stayed inert on his shoulder, his fiery aura muted until called upon.

Kain dearly hoped it wouldn't come to a fight. He hadn't gone through all the trouble of staying out of his own way throughout several millennia of time bending insanity just to have this young idiot take his head off in a fit of pique. Shaking his fingers clean methodically, he spoke to the pool; not wanting to shock anyone pressing a sword to his person.

"Just another vampire. Much like yourself."

"Impossible." The youth cut him off coldly. "I am the last. The Pillars told me so."

"The Pillars?" Kain tested gently. "Surely you mean Ariel. Or rather her ghost. She would say that of course, she had no knowledge of my presence here."

"You know of Ariel? Are you party to her treachery?!" The flaming sword scorched his shoulder as his young alter-ego snarled. "Face me, villain, I am in no mood to talk to the back of your head forever. Turn- if you are no coward."

"And if I do not?"

"Then I shall kill you even as you stand." The vampire's smirk was audible.

Kain closed his eyes and summoned an eon's worth of patience. "I can understand wanting to break free of those tedious chains of civility and pointless politeness that mortal men suffer under, boy. But at least demonstrate some small respect for your newly acquired ancient lineage. Vampires have no need for petty threats. When eternity is yours, you can afford to spare an occasional moment for forethought and calm reflection."

"What?"

Turning fluidly, Kain easily knocked the fire-blade aside and caught the young vampire by the wrist and throat; hoisting him off the ground entirely. "And once you have reflected on the present situation, I feel certain that you will come to realize that you are in the presence of one whom is deserving of more than a small measure of humility from an ignorant ankle-biter such as you!"

Squeezing until his younger version had to choose between releasing his sword or suffering the indignity of a broken hand, Kain sighed in relief as the vampire chose to let go of the blade in his grasp. Raziel's mutterings on his shoulder faded slightly as the weapon dropped to the ground and extinguished itself. Strangling slowly as the claws of Kain's other hand dug into his throat, his past-self hissed and struggled to gain freedom with his one remaining hand and feet. Luckily the long centuries of evolution had somewhat hardened Kain's skin to the weak attacks that fledglings could put forth, no matter how precocious.

"If you think you can muster composure enough to speak and act rationally for a period of time, I will put you down." Accepting the vampire's wince and lack of flailing for a positive answer, Kain lowered the fledgling until the youth's feet touched the floor. Releasing first his arm and after a careful pause, the vampire's neck, Kain stepped back and folded his arms across his chest.

Noting the mutinous look on the former nobleman's features, he took the precaution of establishing one foot on top of the fallen blade keeping it out of Kain's reach. It was a mere toy when compared to the might even the old Reaver blade had possessed but he still didn't feel the need to be stabbed by it. Sparks and incidental contact with fire he could brush off easily. A burning brand thrust into his guts would undoubtedly sting.

At least he wouldn't need to fear two Reaver's coming together in battle and causing a cataclysm similar to his duel with William the Just. Still it was a pity his earlier self had missed the opportunity to experience the Reaver's killing glory first hand. Sharing in the blade's vicious joy during the final moments of his battle with the Dark Entity, all those years ago, had been one of the headier moments of his short life.

Kain remembered his awe the first time he had picked the Soul Reaver up. Never before that moment had he lent credence to the mythic idea of a sentient weapon. Feeling it in his hands, the frustrated hunger and malice, he had feared that its hatred of him would burn through his bone and cartilage. And yet, it hadn't hurt him, fed, certainly, but never to the point of harm. Somehow the maddened spirit within the blade had bent to his will, and together they had cut through entire armies.

It had taken weeks to get used to the idea of an eternally thirsty weapon at his side. Months before its maddened aura stopped troubling his dreams. Grimly glad to not be facing off against the demented soul-sword, Kain rolled his shoulders and forced his thoughts to the present. Raziel's aura brightened visibly, cool light igniting all along the length of the blade, but burning especially bright in the skull's eye sockets. His former lieutenant was alert and actively aware of his momentary burst of reverie.

/I won't let you become like that, child./ Kain whispered to his blade. /I will not abandon you to madness and despair./

He could tell by the reflected light on the walls of the cave around him that his weapon flared once in moody brilliance before quelling its flames again.

_And what if there is nothing that can be done to stop it?_

/Unacceptable./ He replied to the wordless burst of bitter resignation that washed over him. /As you did not forsake me then. I will not abandon you now./

Kain, the younger Kain, drew back several paces at the silent burst of magic, eyes narrowed as he rubbed his bruised neck. He only remained cowed for a handful of minutes however before he regained equilibrium. "Well? Am I supposed to be overawed by your petty theatrics? Speak, demon, or let me pass. I see no point in wasting civility on those with no words of their own."

"Patience, Kain." Wondering where it was best to begin, Kain stared at his younger self in the half light. In a fit of impatience, he summoned a globe of occult fire to illuminate their discourse. The magical sphere rose out of his hand to hover near the ceiling, the entire cave's aspect changing with the luminous glow it provided. The fledgling's pallid skin and hair looked paler still under the flickering white light. The youth was singularly unimpressed, folding his arms in silent annoyance. "I only wish to speak with you a moment. After that you can go about your business unmolested."

"And my sword?"

"I believe it would be best if it stays where it is until our conversation is over." Kain smirked at himself. "You seem a trifle hot blooded, vampire. I have no wish to cross blades with you today."

"I don't need a weapon to deal with you!" Came the angry reply.

"No you have a host of other tricks by now, don't you." Kain chuckled as he dredged up old memories. "Flay was a favorite. Blood Fount had its uses. And then there was that one with the spectral vines that poisoned even as they…"

"How is it that you know these things?" The younger vampire stared at him in horrified amazement. "And my name! You called me Kain, yet I know you not."

"Look closely, vampire. Look very closely and see the truth for yourself." Kain offered cynically. "You know very well who I am."

Looking across a span of a few feet, and several thousand years, the pair of Kain's examined each other. It was hard for him to imagine ever being so young. He looked so mundane; human and weak. It was truly amazing to realize that he had survived his youthful stupidity. Destiny had clearly had worked hard to ensure he lived through his years of blundering about.

Seeing the young vampire brought back strange memories. The feel of his long-lost Wraith armor, how it chaffed against one of his ribs particularly. It had been constructed for a different man originally, and had never quite fit comfortably, no matter how much he had fiddled with the padding. At least the discomfort wasn't visible. Kain eyed his past and acknowledged that the glossy black armor was elegant enough in its way. Far more palatable than that disgusting suit of magical flesh he had worn while fighting Bane and the other Guardians.

The wraith armor, had done its duty well over the early years of his crusade. It had kept him alive when all manner of men and fiends sought his death. As a fledgling he would have been lost without it. He had no interest however in ever wearing it again. The handicaps involved with full suit armor were considerable. If nothing else there was the annoying surplus of goods that went with it, oil, rasp, polishing cloths, spare pads, belts and buckles, not to mention the expense of a blacksmith should serious mending be needed. The daily maintenance of the suit had required a pack all its own. Added to that were the goods and supplies needed to maintain his youthful vanity and comfort, blankets, brushes, cologne, clean shirts, knives, and all manner of other luggage. Comparing his own economy of lifestyle to the boy in front of him with his pony's worth of necessities, it was almost funny to think of how far he had come. Certainly the fledgling looked, and probably smelled, prettier. But he was hopelessly overburdened with the trappings of his recent humanity.

After several eons of practice, and evolutions past-count, Kain found he could survive adequately just about anywhere with only a belt-pouch and blade to supplement his wants. He had become minimalist in his years in the dark future, both by intention, and by natural lack of resources. If fast movement was necessary, he could depart in an instant, confident in the knowledge that he left nothing behind. He doubted the boy could manage half so well.

The only benefit to youth, as far as he could determine was entirely superficial. As a fledgling he had been more than passing handsome, in a pale, arrogant, sort of way. His features were not overly narrow, and were well made. He looked well in armor, and had a tone enough build to pull off most continental fashions without embarrassment. Caught from the side and in a good mood, he might have even described the fledgling as pretty, although he wouldn't have labeled himself such, so many years ago. Pretty enough to catch Umah's jaded eye a few hundred years later, as badly as that had gone. Pretty enough to even turn Raziel's head perhaps, had he had any interest at the time in being attractive to his fledgling. The thought almost made him laugh.

After dealing with the failures that his first batch of fledglings had turned out to be, Kain's only true desire from his second batch was that they follow orders, and not rise above themselves. Even the consistent excellence of his first lieutenant had inspired nothing more than a moderation of contempt he held for the others. It wasn't until his empire was several centuries old that he relaxed enough in Raziel's presence to concede that there was anything between them beyond orders given and obeyed.

Silently he wondered how it would have been different, if Nuraptor's madness hadn't infected him, and through him his fledglings. He would have to ask his latest ally, when the current events were settled. The templar-Raziel providing his admirable distraction outside would be the perfect source of answers in regards to that particular line of 'what if'.

At last the younger vampire jerked back, recognizing something in his thoughtful gaze that gave him pause. "You… are… the same as me?"

"I am Kain. Just as you are." He agreed calmly. "But you are the Kain that I once was. Where as I am the Kain that with any luck you will never become."

"You're the- What?"

Watching his younger self try to puzzle through the logic was a sad exercise. He cut the youth off in favor of a new line of reasoning. "You know by now, that it is your fate to be the Guardian of Balance."

"I am not giving up my life just to satisfy the xenophobic demands of that vaporous tart haunting the Pillars!" The vampire hissed. "For all her noble words, she has wished me dead from the beginning, fearing the power of my blood, the future of my empire."

"All this is true." Kain agreed. "Although to be fair, in her misguided way she has Nosgoth's best interest at heart."

"Misguided? Misguided how?" Curious, the handsome vampire gave him a quizzical look.

"She believes earnestly that the total destruction of vampires is the only way out of our current dilemma." He settled himself on the edge of the fountain, glad that his audience was warming to him a little. "When in fact the exact opposite is true. Had you allowed yourself to be her sacrifice, the world would even now be overrun by demons of every stripe and size; doomed to destruction even before your lifeless husk dissolved back into dust."

"So my choice was the correct one?" Young Kain sneered. "How then is it that you exist, old one, so scarred and monstrous? If you are to be my future, I find I'd have rather chosen death. You're almost as green as Vorador! Thank god you don't have the pelt! Although in looking at you I wonder if it might not be better if you did have fur, it would cover up some of your ugly, wrinkled old carcass."

"Callow vanity does not become you, Kain." Kain glared at his past-self in irritation. "Victory is the thing. It always was. Do you not seek it now? The time has come for war. Mobius is no longer a threat to you. The mercenary army is ripe for slaughter. By the end of the century this corner of this world will be at your feet."

"All of this sounds passing fair." The youth conceded. "But if everything is sweet blood and victorious trumpeting, what are you doing here, looking for all the world like a demon's moldering corpse?"

"Mind your tongue, child." Kain growled. "I am here to warn you. And to arm you against an anomaly that has arisen. Before you can embark on your quest to conquer the world there is one last enemy you must overcome."

"Where is this prey? Show him to me and I shall drink his life's blood!"

"He is not prey, not exactly." Kain tilted his hand back and forth. "His name is Janos Audron. He is author of your very existence, in a round-about way. He is currently possessed by the same Dark Entity that has overcome various members of the Circle in turn and has orchestrated this whole Pillar-calamity. You need to release him from this evil, or destroy him before he can do as much for you."

His past-self tapped his chin in carefully choreographed contemplation. "You come into the past to tell me some old bogeyman of the First Seraphan Crusade is here to destroy me? Surely you jest."

"Do not underestimate him, or the Entity within him, Kain." Kain resisted the urge to shake the egotistical fledgling until his teeth rattled. "He is the last of the true vampire race, functionally immortal and damn near indestructible."

"He was killed by a mob of jumped-up human crusaders five-hundred years ago." The pale vampire sneered. "His heart was cut out of his chest even while he yet lived. Hardly a serious threat, even if he is a vampire."

"His heart still had enough magic within it to restore you from death these five-hundred years later." Kain pointed out grimly. "With it restored to him, he has risen again. Even possessed, his powers and his strength are considerable. As I see it you have only one possible path to victory."

"I'll humor you, old man. Name your path."

Kain eased Raziel's blade off his back. For all simple appearances it was the twin to the blade that ought to have been his former-self's weapon of choice. The skull's eye sockets flared sullenly at what he was about to do. /It is necessary, child. Tolerate him for just a little while. Maybe his personality will improve after being bathed in your fire as I was./

_It'll take more than a little scorching to knock his ego down to size._

He almost smiled again at the cynical glare the skull sent his way.

"Exchange blades with me, Kain." He held out the weapon which appropriately enough, flared with cold fire again. "I would grant you the greatest weapon you could ever hope to wield. A weapon destined for the hand of the Scion of Balance. You could say it is your birthright."

"What's wrong with it?" The young vampire winced at the brilliant flames.

"It is the light of Balance." Kain felt foolish at the need to explain. Surely the fledgling could see for himself the value of the gift he was offered? Apparently not.

"The blade was recently forged in the spiritual fire of the Balance Pillar's Guardians throughout the ages, both vampire and human. All their strength and wisdom, endowed within the sword, have granted it with unique and incredible power. With it at your side all illusions will be dispelled, all barriers will crumble, all injuries shall be healed."

"Sounds like snake oil to me." His younger self muttered. "What will you do with my sword?"

Kain blinked at the question, not having considered that his younger version would be able to resist the immediate temptation of awesome power free for the taking. "I… am not entirely sure, child. Doubtless I shall find its service an adequate replacement for the blade I am surrendering to you."

"You're just going to give me this supposed religious relic of a sword - a sword that in your own words has no equal, in exchange for my own? You're either a madman or a liar." The young vampire crossed his arms, glaring. "What sort of fool do you take me for? Do you honestly think such a feeble trick would work?"

"I do not understand your meaning, Kain." Kain murmured threateningly at the younger vampire.

"You just want to deceive me into surrendering the flaming sword! You know perfectly well my weapon is the only one of its kind and you mean to take it from me! Probably to exact some revenge for your former masters the Pillar Guardians." The vampire flipped his white-blond hair over his shoulder, pleased with his deductions. "You're some sort of fiend, summoned by that madwoman who claimed to be Mistress of Dimension; you and your so-called-holy sword both. Look at the pair of you! I've seen lepers more comely, and that evil hilt! Disgusting. This blade you offer me is no doubt some sort of trap, probably will vanish into a wisp of swamp effluence the minute you are out of sight!"

"It is no trap, I swear to you." Kain gritted his teeth, determined not to let his temper get the better of him. "You have only to take it up a moment to see the truth for yourself. If you still find you're displeased with it you can trade it back to me."

"I shall do no such thing, pretender." The vampire gestured imperiously. "Remove your foot from my blade, beast, or prepare to defend yourself!"

"Surely we can be reasonable about this." Kain argued grimly. "I wish for nothing but your future victories, boy."

"And I wish for nothing but that which is rightfully mine, specter. Go back to whatever hell spawned you, pretender, and mock my ambition no more." His younger self made a vague attempt to snatch the sword still pinned beneath Kain's foot. Almost on instinct, his grip shifted from offering Raziel's blade up to holding the idiot at bay with it. The fire along the edge of the Reaver shifted from white to nearly invisible blue flames. He could feel the heat of Raziel's outrage trembling up and down the length of it.

/Easy, child./

_Even for you, Kain, this vampire is insufferable._

Kain winced at the palpable disgust. /Never-the-less./

"Fount of Putrescence!"

/That was the name of the damn spell!/ Bemused by the sudden reminder of his long forgotten magic, Kain almost forgot to dodge the acidic blob that was summoned and flung his direction.

_Kain!_

Twisting his arm even as he shifted to the right, he found the Soul Reaver and his body moved in instinctive accord. The blade swept up to cut through the enchanted slime even as his thoughts came together. Rather than creating a noxious spatter on the floor from which the enchanted flesh eating vines could erupt, the viscous spell combusted on contact with the edge of the sword, igniting into vapor and vanishing with a wet hiss.

A secondary impulse had Kain lunging forward to slide his captured blade out of his assailant's reach. The young vampire rammed forcefully into his arm instead, his grab for the weapon thwarted.

"Now now." He chided firmly, seeing his younger self summoning his energy for another mystical attack. The fledgling ignored him, which wasn't much of a surprise.

"Die fiend! Evicer-"

Kain's fist impacted squarely in the center of the handsome vampire's face before the spell ever left the youth's fingertips. Doubtless the aborted magic would leave a nasty burn behind.

Kain, the younger, wouldn't discover that unfortunate side effect for at least half a day it seemed, because the force of the sudden blow to his skull - easily capable of cracking solid oak beams - left the vampire completely insensible. Patting the boy's face paternally, Kain quashed the sudden childish regret that he hadn't broken the creature's pretty nose. No doubt someone else would have the honor in the near future. Probably Vorador, looking back it was a wonder the older vampire hadn't strangled him in his sleep as a young creature.

"You'll have to be many years older boy, and centuries wiser, before you could have a hope of defeating me." Kain shook his head as he stood over the comatose vampire.

Finding some useful looking cord in the younger Kain's pack, he smirked and proceeded to hog-tie him. "Then again, by the time you get to be my age, I'll be that much older and wiser still."

--

Leaving the younger vampire to sleep off his hotheadedness, Kain returned to daylight, admitting defeat. There would be nothing useful forthcoming from that quarter. It really should have been no surprise that what needed doing fell, as ever, to him. Scanning the sky, he couldn't tell what the outlook on his 'distraction' was, but distant crash of timber promised something interesting was happening nearby. He opted to stay with the shadowy pines for the first leg of his journey to the Pillars' sanctuary. Even between the fragrant trees, the smell of charred stone was carried by the breeze. Any bandits in the area were probably still cowering from the initial explosion. No one tried to interfere with his progress as he cut across country.

Kain found himself at the top of a reasonable outcrop looking down on the pitted highway and valley beyond. He paused, crouching in the tall grass to appreciate the excellent view. In the sky above were two winged vampires, still dueling brutally between the shattered remains of the nine columns. Black and grey wings beat the air as the pair circled and clashed.

Directly ahead lay the shattered gates and surrounding guard-towers that protected the ancient clearing beyond. Hunks of polished white stone lay scattered everywhere, their smooth sides catching the sunlight despite the dusty haze. A fragment of column easily twelve meters long lay half-embedded in the hillside to his right, at rest atop a pile of shattered trees. Looking out over the surrounding forest, Kain could easily spot a dozen more gaps in the tree-line where similar fragments had fallen. Pieces had probably been flung as far as Stenchenroe, possibly even Willendorf. He couldn't remember caring particularly, as a young man, but in seeing it now, the magnitude of the disaster was remarkable.

A clash of magic overhead drew his attention back to the battle of the moment. Audron and Raziel circled each other like a pair of vultures, each trying to gain advantage of height over the other. At some unidentifiable signal they closed again, one diving down while the other banked sharply. Their mid-air collision was audible despite the distance.

Kain wasn't sure whether he was surprised or not, to see his lieutenant was the more agile flier. Audron had been airborne his entire existence. Even his Hylden body-thief was supposedly capable of flight once upon a time. But Hash'a'gik was not able to keep up with the harassing tactics that Raziel applied. For all his future-child's wings were monstrous when fully fanned, the knight had a knack for flitting and diving between the obstacles of their battlefield, using finger and toe claws for leverage just as readily as feathers for lift. His enemy on the other hand was slower to press his physical advantage, and resorted more often than not to magical attacks. The green bolts of energy and repulsing shields were more than passing familiar to Kain. The Seraphan Lord of Meridian had used very similar tactics in their battles. All Hylden had the same tutors when it came to war-craft it seemed. Either that or they were the same fiend. Kain wouldn't have been surprised either way.

Feeling rather ignored by the two fliers, Kain abandoned stealth in favor of the road. The broken gates of the Pillars' Sanctuary provided no obstacle. Any Seraphan mercenaries that hadn't been killed outright had long fled the area of the cataclysm.

The Pillars themselves had completed their initial phase of collapse. Building-sized blocks of polished stone lay strewn about the vicinity of their platform, but the rain of destruction had abated. Dust hung heavily in the air, and the scent of ozone teased the nose, but the main event was over. He appraised the calamity with long practiced competence, and felt it safe enough to settle himself on the broken off stump of the Pillar of States. The earth had settled to a tenuous rumbling beneath his feet, rather than the steady quakes of earlier.

It was beyond-odd to find himself on the platform without receiving some immediate rebuke from Ariel's ghost. Kain frowned when he suddenly realized the truth. Ariel was already gone. No longer would they hiss and call each other names throughout the long centuries to come. No more would he be obliged to put up with catching glimpses of the two-faced ghost as she prowled mournfully amongst the broken columns. His very own personal conscience, and an unwanted one at that, she had haunted him for eons. But now Ariel and the other Balance Guardians had been invested into the Reaver he wore across his back, and from Raziel's blade their powers also fed into him. She had found her peace at long last, or, from her perspective, perhaps a few days early? For a moment he wondered that he would actually miss verbally fencing with the easily-flustered specter, but truly, the Pillars were far more peaceful without her sharp-tongued presence. It had been fun to annoy her for the first few hundred years. After that she became more of a nuisance than anything.

Still, nothing could be considered peaceful so long as his new Raziel, and the damnable Hylden continued their aerial dog-fight. From his front-row seat, Kain watched another volley between the two vampires. He was impressed to see that at some point his hesitant ally had put the spear he found to good use. Audron's right leg had been pierced clean through by the pike's tip. A good half-meter of the shaft had broken off in Audron's thigh as the Hylden-possessed man fought on. Raziel on the other hand was favoring his shield arm but using a sword to harass his enemy whenever an opportunity to get in close arose.

It was apparent that their skirmish had become a battle fought by inches. Raziel was agile enough to dodge most of the older vampire's attacks, but the ones that hit, hit hard. Audron was a clumsy flier, but more than fast enough to block any close attacks. The ancient left few openings for Raziel's short-ranged weapon.

Even as Kain watched, Raziel feinted a moment too late and was caught by the face in one of the ancient's oversized hands. With no leverage to be had while air born, his lieutenant tried to buffet the ancient with his wings as he struggled with the Audron's grip, but it was to no avail. Flung away like piece of rubbish, Raziel was tossed across the short span between the Pillars of Dimension and Nature, and impacted with a painful sounding crack against the top half of the second column. The Pillar of Nature shook and rained fragments on the platform with the strength of the blow. Shedding a trail of broken feathers and blood as he slid down to the base, Raziel somehow managed to stagger to his feet and summoned a shield of fire in a desperate attempt to avoid destruction. A torrent of raging orange flames erupted outward and upwards at the vampire's wordless cry, pushing the air with their heat in a concussive burst.

Hash'a'gik easily changed his angle of decent and veered off, narrowly avoiding the summoned flames. The creature laughed mockingly as he turned in the air and gained altitude. Raziel staggered and braced himself against his Pillar, gathering his wits, but the Hylden had no such handicap.

Audron grinned like a maniac as he ripped the remains of the spear from his leg. The broken weapon clattered uselessly down against the Pillar's platform and rolled into the tall grass. Beating massive wings against the dusty air, the possessed ancient circled over his prey, enjoying his impending victory over the exhausted vampire.

Kain stood instinctively even as Raziel stubbornly attempted to take wing and face his tormentor. From his perch, he could see what his battered lieutenant was too dazed to realize. One of Raziel's wings was in tatters, stained with the vampire's blood from where the fragile bones had pierced the skin. Well into his first thousand years, the vampire might be, but reknitting the damage would not be instantaneous. Kain grimaced, supposing that the man was too dazed, or the injury too severe, for him to be fully aware of the extent of his own peril. Raziel discovered it quickly enough. His attempt to fly ended as soon as he flexed the damaged limb. Instead of leaping airborne to anticipate the next attack, he crumpled to the ground with a choked cry, clutching awkwardly at his shoulder, the real damage unreachable. His left wing dragged limply along the stone platform as vampiric regeneration warred with injury and exhaustion in mending the shattered bones. Kain moved to intercept before his surrogate son was torn apart by the creature diving for him.

It was pure luck that the Hylden had eyes for nothing but his prey. Raziel's distress provided the perfect bait for the creature. Kain didn't bother to draw the Reaver from its sheath. Instead he gathered a force projectile in the palm of his hand, timing the blast of magical energy to catch Hash'a'gik broadside. Releasing the first bolt, Kain mustered a second with a vicious twist of will and sent it chasing after. The blue-skinned vampire was oblivious to the threat even at it hit; limbs and wings bent sideways as the invisible wall of violence caught him and threw him through the air. Getting nothing less then he deserved, the Dark Entity was slammed against the nearest Pillar and flattened against its crumbling bulk with an angry cry.

Kain winced slightly as his projectile proved more durable than the fragile Pillar it impacted with. The totem of the elemental force of Death, already weakened by the cataclysm, shivered and then shattered anew as the force of his first attack rolled over it. The second blast pulverized the top-most segment completely, mashing through the broken stonework like a cannonball and casting a barrage of stone shards, and Audron, over the meadow as the Pillar disintegrated.

Tossed end over end through the air with the last of the force bolt's energy, the ancient vampire's body was flung well and away across the field to crash into the trees. Kain didn't delude himself into thinking it would stun the Hylden for long. The injuries to the host might inconvenience it somewhat, but something more permanent would have to be done before he would consider the battle over.

Moving quickly he hooked a hand under Raziel's shoulder, hauling him onto to his feet. Up close the scent of blood and feathers made an odd combination. "Can you run?"

"Run?" The knight looked at him in pained amusement, accepting his presence as a matter of course. "I crawl, dread lord. But yes, I get your meaning."

Wearily glancing around, Raziel frowned in confusion. "But where is your other-self? The one from this era… Isn't it he whom is supposed to defeat this devil?"

"There's been a slight change of plans." Kain drawled, still irritated by the vampire he had once been. "I will deal with this Hylden first, and then will see what can be done about the rest."

"I wish I could stay and help." His lieutenant was mauled and covered in filth, but his tired smile was oddly endearing. "I fear I will be of little use even as bait now that the Adversary knows you are here."

"Can you heal yourself?"

"I think so." The vampire sagged into his supporting grip and then mustered the strength to stand on his own. "Just don't ask me to fly before sunset. I landed badly just now."

"I saw." Kain smiled without humor. "Don't look back, just head for the trees. I will make sure Audron doesn't ruffle your tail feathers."

"Very funny, my lord."

"Less back-chat, and more retreating, child." He gave the knight a gentle push towards the edge of the platform. For a moment he was afraid the vampire would simply collapse under the forced momentum. Staggering stiffly, Raziel survived the first few awkward strides and found his feet. Kain shook his head as he watched the vampire begin a torturous sort of limping jog for the nearest line of trees.

Not long after his lieutenant disappeared behind the initial layer of scrub and trees, a crashing rush of noise behind Kain heralded the return of his real prey. He turned, smiling grimly at the sight of the leaf-bedecked ancient hovering in the air above him. The vampire's wings were looking decidedly tattered after his forcible journey through the forest canopy. The smell of burnt feathers was none of his doing however. His projectiles might crush and shatter, but they weren't meant to ignite. Kain studied the smoldering effect with interest.

Vampire physiology and Hylden energies were simply incompatible at a fundamental level, Kain was forced to conclude. Audron's wings were smoking even as they beat the air, reacting to the greenish aura that ghosted over his entire body. Strange growths of bone and muscle slid over the man's face and exposed arms. His skin cracked and glowed as if containing embers within. Dark blood wept and smoldered from the injuries Raziel had managed to inflict.

Janos was both burning up, and also evolving in front of his eyes. He hadn't noticed the effect on their previous encounter, but his memories of the various aborted futures he and Raziel's wraith had inadvertently created were too new to be entirely trusted. He distinctly recalled Audron possessed, and Audron in the form of a monstrous fiend in the bowels of Meridian, but actively being dissolved by glyph energy, no. That at least was a novelty.

Other than the painful looking reaction to prolonged contact with the Hylden, Audron looked much like he had in Kain's tentative memories. Better dressed, perhaps, but still undeniably and unbelievably blue-skinned. There was no mistaking him for anything but descended from the ancient race from which all vampires came. The vampire's eyes burned with a sickly green light that echoed his new aura. Kain wondered briefly whether his memories of Janos and the 'factory' would remain should he butcher the man here in the past. Perhaps the change would be significant enough to force another realignment of the time-stream, perhaps not. He also wondered if in another, less misbegotten future than his own, if he too had been destined to pick up the outlandish skin-tone. It was a foolish thing to worry about when the faced with a raving lunatic of a Hylden-possessed ancient, but he couldn't help but wonder.

"Hash'a'gik, I suppose?" Kain buffed his claws against his cape, less impressed by his enemy then he thought he might be. "Or should I call you, Dark Entity."

"Kain!" The creature hissed incredulously. "But no! Wrong one! Where is your other-self, foolish vampire? Where is the Kain we are destined to meet?"

He shrugged in half-feigned boredom. "You were late in getting here, Hylden. Raziel must have delayed your departure. The Kain you were supposed to seek out finished his work on Moritanius long before you arrived, and then, seeing no reason to stand about with the day wasting, he left. It's hardly his fault you missed your cue."

Smiling cruelly, Kain raised his arms in a welcoming gesture. "I felt badly for you, Hylden, and so sent another playmate to keep you company. What did you think of my new son?"

"A new Raziel." Hash'a'gik muttered, bobbing back and forth in the air before slowly descending to the ground. Vampire wings were clearly not cut out for hovering gracefully, Kain noted. It boded well for his chances of confounding the entity, if it found his conversation interesting enough to be willing to sacrifice an aerial advantage to speak without disruption. "You were not content to sacrifice just one, but found another to feed to your false-god? Foolish Kain. You toy with the Wheel."

"The Wheel is one fracture away from breaking completely." Kain murmured, shifting his weight in preparation for an attack. The reminder of his repeated need to offer up of his lieutenant's life for the sake of necessity across several timelines only served to renew his long buried anger over the Hylden plot. If it weren't for their stupid fanaticism and the unholy squid beneath the Citadel, his future, and perhaps Raziel's, would have been far more agreeable. "In that one sense, I wouldn't be surprised to find our goals ran parallel, Hylden. I care not if fate is torn asunder. I find it suits me not at all to be dictated to like an errant schoolboy. That creature is no god of mine."

"Join with me then!" The creature gestured grandly. "Break the last lock to our prison and we will slaughter the burrowing parasite who claims to be the God of Vampires! Its wheel will be no more, and we all shall be free."

"Free? You mean 'free' until you and your demonic-pets swarm over everything and poison what life there is out of the world." Kain agreed grimly. "Free until the realization sinks in for you, that without the Pillars, Nosgoth is doomed. Or did you think they were good for nothing, other than acting as your tomb?"

Hash'a'gik hissed in maddened fury. "Treacherous vampire. Just like all the others."

Kain folded his arms across his chest and sighed at the creature's irrational attitude. "Not so. I have little use for subterfuge at this point. I freely acknowledge that what my fore-bearers did to your race was foolish in the extreme." He showed a smile that was mostly teeth. "But what is done is done. Not even I can spin time so adroitly as to go back to the beginning and undo all of your mistakes. I happen to think your current plan for revenge is banal and ill-conceived, and I am more than happy to tell you so. I have no interest in destroying the last of the Pillars just to free your pathetic race."

"If and when I allow you out of your prison, it will be at a time of my choosing. Be a good little Dark Entity now, and run along home. Perhaps I will consider leniency when the time comes to resolve your people's situation once and for all."

"We will escape with or without you, Kain!" Hash'a'gik howled. "We have grown strong during our time in hell! We shall tear this world apart and you with it!"

"If it is a repeat of the old war you want, Hylden, then that is what you shall get. I will be well content to crush the skulls of every member of your pitiable tribe one-at-a-time if I must, until only your demented shades remain to mourn you." Kain raised his clenched his fist to emphasize his resolve. "Point of fact, I welcome it. I can't abide the thought of leaving things half-done forever."

"Soon, vampire. The portal is already opening wide enough to allow us to influence humans. Just a little more, your Pillar shattered, and we will be free to test your promise." Hash'a'gik crooned.

"Well then, beast. Come and do battle with me if you dare. The final Pillar is yours for the taking." Kain unsheathed his sword, watching as its aura ignited. Aware of the argument or not, the Reaver was as ready for mayhem as he was. Its fire was a ruddy orange. For a silent and paranoid instant, Kain cursed himself for not having the presence of mind to ask Raziel – his Raziel - how the damn blade's new magic worked while he had had the chance. It was far too late to practice now. He just had to hope that the being inside the blade could give him some assistance as needed.

Audron's possessed body laughed wickedly and flung a wall of lightening at him, similar to what Raziel had been battling against before. The electrically charged air was hardly pleasant, but Kain had developed a certain affinity for elemental lighting over the years. It rolled over his skin without any lingering affects. He ignored the sting and dug his toe-claws into the stone of the platform as the concurrent blast of ionized air tried to knock him off his feet. The attack would have been more effective against a winged enemy, he thought, bringing his sword around to easily block the ensuing physical attack. Clearly the Hylden wasn't taking him seriously.

Flame erupted from his sword as the blade met Audron's second magical wave, beating back the blast of dark energy with a ring of fire hot enough to scorch the hem of Kain's cape. The Dark Entity was obliged to back-wing to avoid the expanding wave of heat, sparks and embers flying through the air. Kain raised his free hand to protect his eyes from some of the blow over.

/ Can we avoid fire in future? I'm not that invulnerable, you know. / He criticized his sword sharply.

To his grim satisfaction the sword's aura shifted rapidly from color to color as if someone was making some judicious decisions. Audron snatched up Raziel's fallen spear and launched himself at Kain again. The Reaver settled on a vaporous sort of white. At the instant that contact was made between the Hylden's battered weapon and the sword, a surge of gale-force wind erupted from the hilt, almost driving Kain off his feet again.

He couldn't help but chuckle despite the unexpected strength of the attack. The eddying winds tangled in his hair and whipped strands across his face, but again his claws held him firmly against the earth. His opponent had no such luck. Audron had caught the energy full in the face, and had tumbled backwards in the air in a very inelegant fashion. The broken spear had been torn from the ancient's grip and was lost in the field beyond. Seemingly dissatisfied, the sword switched from white to bright blue with a resolute flare of energy.

"Done?" Kain couldn't help but ask sarcastically.

The glowing skull decoration on the pommel simply flickered malevolently at him. "What are you glaring for? I can hardly be expected to memorize your every gimmick and trick, child. My agenda was quite busy enough in unraveling this plot; while you were trotting around the countryside sightseeing. You neither needed nor wanted my interference into your own strengthening regimen."

If the sword could have, it would have tapped its foot in irritation. Kain sighed and replied with only minimal irony. "Please do as you think best, of course. I defer to your excellent judgment."

Surprisingly he was rewarded with an instant of mental contact. An image danced behind his eyes, depicting himself stabbing at his irksome flying enemy with the blue Reaver. As soon as the blade touched his prey, the vampire was encased in a block of ice. Kain blinked and the projection was gone. He stared in wonder at his sword as Janos winged back to the fight. Raziel was not entirely without means of initiating a conversation, it seemed. Sadly there was no time to explore the hypothesis further. The Hylden-possessed vampire was within range for his more annoying attacks. Kain was not above taking a suggestion in regards to how to get the ancient down on the ground for good, especially one as entertaining as what Raziel had proposed. He grinned evilly. "By all means, let us make an attempt."

Rolling out of the way of the Hylden's first swooping attack, and cynically sidestepping the bevy of fireballs that came next, Kain used his free hand to direct a new kinetic shockwave at his enemy, goading him into diving again.

This time it was child's play to jump and meet Audron's dive mid-air. Spinning and thrusting downward as he anticipated his confused enemy's attack, Kain succeeded in opening a wound along one of the ancient's arms. The physical injury closed almost immediately, but an uncanny chill arose from the air. The Reaver drew strength from him and channeled it into a complex elemental pattern along the length of its blade, its steely song triumphant. Moisture condensed and crystallized out of the sky to shroud his enemy, freezing half his chest and an entire wing inside of a miniature iceberg. Audron fell abruptly, unable to sustain or control his flight, and smashed hard up against the ground. Chunks of the frozen debris slid in every direction from the crash, the rest steamed and crackled against the fallen vampire's skin as it melted.

Kain took no pity on the possessed vampire. Somersaulting to control his own fall, he landed firmly on his prey's back, letting the damaged wings take the brunt of his weight.

"Too easy," he sneered at his writhing enemy as he dug his toe-claws in to Audron's chest. "And here I thought you'd be a challenge compared to before. It's just more of the same."

"Do not crow too loud, little vampire." The Hylden hissed angrily. "Do not forget, unlike Moratanius, this one's body is strong. What is a little pain to one who has known hell?! We will never give up. We need no rest. We can continue this fight for as long as it takes!"

"We? Forgive my ignorance, I simply have to inquire." Kain crouched down to smirk at his prey, sliding the icy cold Reaver along Audron's neck. "Exactly how many of you does it take to subdue one senile old vampire?! It must be a tight fit, all that ego in such a confined space. Perhaps I'll cut you apart and count for myself."

A burst of green light, undoubtedly Hylden glyph-energy, cast him off his enemy before he could strike the fatal blow. Kain rolled and came to his feet, wincing at the scorched feel of his arms. As a young vampire, he had once been fool enough in Meridian to throw himself into one of the damnable energy barriers to test its might. The painful tingle along his skin was much the same sensation as when those invisible walls had repelled him.

Nothing vampiric could withstand the close knit and caustic energies of the glyph barriers. The only thing to be done had been to find a way around the annoying obstacles, or to deactivate them. Sadly neither was really an option today. Kain fell back and considered his attack. Audron slowly pulled himself upright, cracking the remaining ice away from his body as he did so.

The only good news was that the vampire's left wing looked too frayed to fly effectively. In that at least he had achieved a measure of revenge for Raziel's injury. It would be a day or so before the vampire would be airborne again, Kain wagered. Unless of course the Hylden spirits had some manner of healing their hosts that he was unaware of. From appearances, they were doing Janos more harm than good with their occupation.

For his part, he could already feel the Reaver's soothing touch on his scrapes and bruises. The sword was intent on taking care of him it seemed. Ironic really, given Raziel's furious spite lately, that the sword was so eager to nurse-maid him now. It was all or nothing with the boy, he shook his head. It always had been. Probably the spirit was feeling a little guilty about the whole debacle at Avernus. Other than general exhaustion, it was likely he'd walk out of this fight with nothing more sinister than a paper-cut, if the Reaver had its way. It almost felt like cheating.

Snarling, the Hylden resumed its fight with a waved gesture, releasing another round of fireballs at him in annoyance. "Die, Kain!"

Dodging the brutish magic, Kain closed the distance between them and swung the Reaver against the barrier. The blade shrieked in audible dismay as its fire fought against the glyph wall. Clearly, Raziel was still vampire enough that he didn't appreciate taking the Hylden energies to the face, as it were. In time he might hack through it, he supposed. The Reaver's fire managed to discolor and drain the enchantment a little, despite its discomfort. But he wasn't interested in annoying his sword if alternate methods were available.

Kain fell back to consider his options. Not above asking for aid from his troublesome weapon, he cast a glance at it out of the corner of his eye. "I don't suppose you have any other ideas?"

No worse for the wear, the sword flickered through a few different colors before settling on a cool green only a few shades off from the Hylden's aura. Unable to guess the meaning of the mimicry, Kain cursed as the weapon nearly jerked out of his grasp, moving with a will of its own to plunge down into the packed soil around the Pillars. The earth beneath his feet abruptly began to tremble and crack, fresh fissures opening and radiating outwards through the grasses.

Falling to his knees, Kain had grim fantasies of being swallowed up by a sink hole, but that fate was apparently reserved for his enemy. Several fissures consolidated underneath the baffled Dark Entity and it wailed in frustration as the ground softened and seemed to drop out beneath him. Before wings could be coordinated into an attempt to lift, the creature was swallowed up in a gaping fissure that just as suddenly crushed back together with a low rumble. All that was left was a dent in the grass where the sinkhole had been. The Pillars shook and shed bits of themselves as the mini earthquake abated. Thankfully no further columns toppled from the new upheaval. Kain rose gingerly to his feet, testing the soft-feeling footing gingerly.

The ground seemed firm enough, but he doubted if it would hold against a strong assault. Sure enough, the grassy depression heaved upwards as he watched, the earth and trembling as if a thousand moles were hard at work beneath the surface. The soil mounded and finally cracked in front of him, erupting in a dry geyser as the Hylden broke free of his make-shift grave. Kain rolled out of the way of an omni-directional blast of green fire that the creature unleashed and glared at his independent minded blade again.

"Warn me before you do that trick as well, Raziel."

The sword merely flickered from green back to translucent blue with a smug twist.

Audron's shield remained as firmly in place as before, despite his unexpected side-trip. Kain pursed his lips in annoyance. Stymied as far as attacking the creature directly, and limited to irritations when using the Soul Reaver to attack indirectly. Kain looked around for some other options. Glancing at the fragile looking remains of the Pillar of Nature gave him a nasty little idea.

He moved backwards, luring his attacker onto the platform at the base of the shattered monoliths even as he dodged another round of the now-boring projectiles. Raziel had apparently done some thinking too. Kain nearly tripped as the sword unexpectedly planted a new thought, unsolicited, into his head.

The sudden memory of Audron, completing a dizzying series of wind borne attacks, only to land panting and exhausted for a moment, bubbled up from nowhere. It took a moment for Kain to realize that the imagery must have come from his ally's recent battle against Hash'a'gik at the top of the ruined Vampire Citadel. He glanced down at his blade with harried appreciation. "So the vampire does have a limit to his stamina, you're saying?" He rolled out of the way of a lightening strike. "Thank you, child. That is useful to know."

Mulling his options over as he feinted and provoked the Hylden into greater magical expenditures, Kain found he had the definite beginnings of a plan. The new Raziel, the one from the future, hadn't the resilience of either Raziel's wraith-body or Kain's own thick skin to protect him in his battle against the ancient. As a result the two had tangled successfully, but the Hylden hadn't needed to truly exert itself either. Kain was confident that the mere physical blows and lesser magics that the Dark Entity preferred wouldn't slow him down nearly as much, especially not with the Soul Reaver so agreeably in hand. All he had to do therefore was push a bit harder, and see if he couldn't make the Hylden sweat a bit for his victory.

Lunging forward, Kain gritted his teeth against the pain and smashed his fist directly into the green barrier unleashing his own burst of lightening against Hash'a'gik's shields. The bolt chased around the magical bubble, sparking and scattering, but didn't overload the spell the way he had hoped. He fell back with a curse and again was nearly taken off balance by Raziel's impromptu aid.

The Reaver blade dipped earthwards again, this time directing itself at one of the sigils etched into the marble platform. Kain gave the image a cursory glance as he attempted to regain his footing and avoid a lunging attack. The sword seemed to be pointing out the ancient rune for water. Raziel's reasoning however was somewhat of a mystery. He had stared at the carving thousands of times through the long centuries of his empire, never thinking twice about it. But now he couldn't help but wonder, as the blade's point seemed stuck fast. He felt the Reaver gather itself, pulling more energy than before, and braced for whatever insanity might come. What he got, was truly a shock to the senses.

The Soul Reaver chimed almost musically with the conclusion of its mysterious spell weaving. The platform echoed the tone with a deeper note that was immediately replaced with a hollow rushing sound. At the blade's prompting, a deluge erupted from the sigil. Icy-cold frothing water was suddenly everywhere. It rose waist deep on the platform as it boiled up out of its magical wellspring and poured forth over the raised marble steps.

Kain could only stare in amazement as the torrent rose and washed around him. The entire base of the Pillars was transformed into an oversized birdbath in an instant, liquid-death pooling and spilling down onto the grassy verge beyond. Kain braced for the acidic burn of the forbidden fluid against his skin; more than old enough to survive a casual dunking, but not masochist enough to enjoy the feeling of being slowly flayed by prolonged contact with the flow.

Strangely, the water scorched but did not sear him. It merely tickled unpleasantly and soaked his leggings and feet. Kain stared at the flood in dumb amazement as it eddied and swirled, waiting for pain that did not come. The Reaver had to be to blame. It was the only possible explanation for his sudden immunity. Raziel had found some way to protect him perhaps. Or maybe it was not true water, but some magical equivalent wrought by the Reaver itself.

Only when Audron began shrieking like an accursed thing, did he remember he was not alone in witnessing the spectacle. He had all but forgotten his own immanent peril in admiring Raziel's minor miracle. Luckily, the Hylden seemed to have other concerns. The glyph shield, so able to withstand his best attacks, could do nothing about the element weaknesses of vampire flesh. It truly looked like water as it came in contact with the ancient's body. The blue flesh of Audron's chest and arms sizzled and incandesced as the wave broke around him.

As far as attacks went, Kain realized, the idea was brilliant. Even when the Hylden went to stretch his wings to escape, the black feathers steamed and dissolved as they were splashed with the cruel liquid.

"Well done, Raziel." He breathed a fervent compliment even as he felt his sword swing free of the sigil. The water stopped almost as soon as it started, gurgling to nothing between his feet and leaving only puddles behind. Kain stepped gingerly, feeling the lingering wet trapped in his clothes. Still, the Reaver's immunity seemed to remain, and he was able to move without injury.

The same could not be said for Hash'a'gik. The creature pawed at its sodden and somewhat flayed skin as it regenerated, still wailing in agony. Somewhere in vampire's distress, the shield had been forgotten.

Kain found he had little pity for the Hylden. First mocked, then repetitively shot at by an irritatingly invulnerable enemy, he wasted no time in taking advantage of his upper-hand. Belting the possessed vampire across the face with the hilt of the Soul Reaver, he mist-shifted to predict the exact location his prey reeled to, and curled the claws of his free hand to duplicate the punch again, putting his shoulder behind it this time. Audron's body curved backwards in the air from the force of his fist, collapsing hard against the center of the platform with the satisfying sound of skull hitting stone.

Unleashing a fury inspired force-projectile against Nature's unsuspecting base. Kain crushed the bottom of the Pillar to gravel, leaving the top five meters of the column to topple to the ground. Even breaking into chunks as it fell, the Pillar did a tidy job of crushing Audron under a quarter ton of fractured weight. The vampire's feeble cry was the most satisfying noise Kain had heard yet. He rolled one of the remaining bits of column out of the way to inspect his handiwork with a smirk.

The creature lying at his feet looked about done in. Feathers and clothes were all but mauled to ribbons, the vampire's handsome blue-skin still struggling to regenerate over the open sores the water had left. The collapsed Pillar had done him the favor of shattering a fair number of the ancient's bones. All in all, a rousing success as far as fights went. Despite the obvious difference in difficulty between this adversary and the one he had fought as a youth, the fight had lasted about as long as his first round with the Dark Entity.

Kain had no doubt what the outcome would have been should it have been the other Kain standing here in his stead. Even with Raziel's help, and a Reaver blade willing to do eight-tenths of the work for him, Kain would have been completely out classed. The thought made him frown. If Kain had died this afternoon, then the Hylden would have won. There would have been no Pillars, no Janos Audron, no Scion, just the Soul Reaver. Raziel would have been damned to become the baleful weapon of blight portrayed in the vampire prophesies, wielded by the Hylden race's savior. Memories of the Hylden Lord and the creature's temporary ownership of the Reaver, made Kain hiss in fury. The hell he would allow these insufferable maggots to take the Reaver now. What life had been like for the blade during those long years that he had lain defeated was anyone's guess, but it was hard to imagine they had be pleasant ones.

This time at least Raziel's imprisonment wouldn't have lasted long. Kain thought morbidly. Kain doubted the Hylden had a plan to restore balance to Nosgoth. Like his own reign over the sorrowful to-come world, they would happily ride the world into the ground until all that was left was dust and ghosts.

Feeling his resolve grow, Kain stepped forward to finish his fight. Magical barriers broken, and physically crippled, Hash'a'gik was all but defeated. Kain laughed breathlessly at his hard-earned victory. Raziel's inexplicable affection for the ancient vampire was unfortunate, but hardly enough to sway his hand.

Audron dead was far easier to plan around than Audron alive. He had survived this long with out the ancient's council. There was no particular purpose for the blue-skinned vampire's continued existence. Kain remembered fragments of their conversations in the alternate timeline of Meridian. Audron had exhibited a death wish at the time, hardly surprising given the miserable events of his life. From all he had read, the ancients were described as damnably suicidal in general. In a way he was doing the man a favor.

If he was very lucky, he could even get his heart back when he was done. It was uncanny to be walking around without one.

Forcing his wrenched shoulder to cooperate, Kain raised the Reaver to finish off his prey. "May you find your next attempt at life more enjoyable than this one was, vampire." He offered in cynical benediction. Kain drove the blade down, intending to pierce the sage's throat; the swiftest and cleanest death he could provide at this point.

The instant the tip of the Reaver made contact with Audron's skin, it, and his arm, were frozen into immobility. Growling in dismay he found that he could neither loosen his hold on the blade, nor press down further. The sword and his limb were stuck fast.

It took only one guess to determine where to lay blame. "Raziel, stop this foolishness at once!"

The blade flickered malevolently in his grip. Kain grimly realized that the sword had now claimed control of his legs as well. The sensation was wholly without comparison. He could feel his body as easily as ever, there was no numbness or pain. But he could no more stir then he could dictate what color the sky ought to be.

"Raziel, kindly consider. While we dither here, the Hylden heals and gathers strength. Do you really want to spend the better part of eternity fighting this creature? We must strike now."

For once he had to admit he had no idea what his lieutenant was thinking. The Reaver simply flickered and vibrated in his hand, seemingly indecisive.

"It was you that forced this fight in the first place." Kain reminded the sword bitterly. "I told you to leave well enough alone!"

That at least provoked a response. The skull on the blade's hilt flared angrily, blue light burning in its empty sockets. He gritted his teeth, feeling the cold burn of Raziel's annoyance down the length of his arm. Kain hissed at the idea that he was obliged to reason with the fool at a time like this. "I realize that you have formed some sort of odd attachment to the vampire, Raziel. But consider. He was dead before you revived him! It's not so much a murder as resolving an unwanted paradox."

The fire burned colder still, Raziel's fury almost a flavor on his tongue. Still the sword made no move. Kain had little doubt that if it wanted, the Reaver could drive him off his victim without difficulty. Yet it didn't. He was stuck dangling like a puppet while his thrice damned sword hung dithering about what to do. For the first time he wondered if this was how his offspring had felt with the spectral Reaver embedded in his arm. The blade was a contented servant only when it wished to be, the rest of the time, like now, it was a damned nuisance.

Bending his will to the effort Kain found that he could resist the Reaver's influence if he focused. Slowly he regained control of his left leg, fighting for every inch of movement as he made lift his foot onto Audron's throat. If Raziel refused to obey him, he had other means at his disposal. A snapped neck was just as quick as a sword stroke, if perhaps not as permanent, but he bet with himself that once the deed was done, his sword would be more reasonable about finishing the job. Or at least it might let him go so he could get on with it.

_Do not do this, Kain!_

The Reaver shuddered again in his grip, more than aware of what he was attempting.

"What would you have me do, child? What other option is there?!"

For a minute the sword went inert, all aura dispelled. Feeling the strength of the charge building in the blade's core, Kain didn't attempt to break the lingering paralysis. Having witnessed several of the sword's 'tricks' in the past half hour, he was willing to bet that this magic too, was going to be unpleasant for both victim and wielder. Kain took the opportunity to turn his face to the side and averted his eyes, the only real defense he could muster while still holding the blade.

No sooner than he had looked away then the blade erupted into a magical fireball. White flames enveloped the length of his arm as the Reaver let loose the full might of the Balance Guardians. For all the ferocity of its brilliance, Kain found the sensation to be wholly benign. Rather than blistering heat there was a cleansing coolness. For a moment at least, exhaustion was dispelled, his spirit buoyed. He squinted down to see what the gentle attack was meant to accomplish.

Beneath the blade's point, the Hylden possessed vampire writhed as if burnt, mouth open in silent scream. Where the spirit-light met Audron's broken body, it drew forth the sickly green aura, forcing the alien energy out of its unwilling host. Kain winced and watched out of the corner of his eye as the dueling magics seemed to contend over the ancient vampire a moment before Raziel won, burning the Hylden away to nothing with a half audible wail of despair. Without the tainted aura, Audron's body grew quiet, almost glowing as it absorbed the healing energy.

Half blinded, Kain could just make out Audron's gradual awakening. The ancient gaped in disbelief as he looked up at his terrifying salvation. No doubt feeling the brutal strength of the cleansing magic as well as felt the auras of those long gone. As abruptly as it started, the spectacle was over. The light, his paralysis, and Hash'a'gik, all vanished as if they had never been.

Kain staggered backwards as Raziel released control of his body, cursing his sword even as he watched Audron's body complete an unnaturally fast recovery. Detached from its prey, the Reaver flickered harmlessly in his grip. He had a sudden and undeniable impression of his child whistling with patently false innocence after doing something he had deliberately forbidden.

Of the Hash'a'gik there was no trace. All that remained behind was a rather battered and bedraggled looking vampire curled against the damp ground. It was safe, Kain supposed, to say the battle was over.


	3. Chapter 3

Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King

(A continuation fan-fiction for Legacy of Kain: Defiance)

/../- implies vampiric 'whisper' a.k.a. telepathy/mental projection.

The Soul Reaver isn't capable of speech as such, but I gave it dialog anyway to show that Kain can interpret its wordless snark without difficulty? I have no idea. Just go with it.

**The End: Chapter 3-**

There was a certain anthropological irony to the situation, Kain realized as he rolled his shoulder to ease the ache in his abused joints. With Janos Audron now healed and whole, a whole swath of his own history, including several false starts that had already been corrected, was now relatively moot.  Guessing what the outcome of the new events would be was an utter mystery.  Janos was no longer a pawn of the Hylden, and so it seemed reasonable to assume Janos would not be imprisoned in Meridian in the near future.  If the ancient one was not imprisoned, then what magical ichor would be used to power the Hylden's inter-dimensional device in three hundred years' time? 

He leaned on his now cooperative sword and contemplated the fractured future, somewhat baffled at how his memories had not yet changed to match events.  The recollection of the beast Audron had become, and his tedious trip through the 'Factory' to find him was as clear as it could be, given the eons that had passed since he lived it.  There was no change to his recollection, as far as he could tell. The future remained obstinantly similar, despite the continued deviance in the present.

History had some how absorbed even this victory, he concluded grimly.  Some how or another, the Hylden must have found another opportunity to capture the vampire in the near future.   Kain shook his head at the mess he was left with.  Thrice-damned Mobius and his many-eyed 'oracle' had orchestrated quite the clever trick in creating this eternal cycle.  Between the pair of them and, he guiltily acknowledged, his own meddling, keeping track of the ever-changing continuum required a half day of careful calculation and a slide rule that moved in three dimensions. 

Not for the first time, Kain wondered if his meeting with Janos Audron in that dark future Meridian was a sign that he was on the right track, or the wrong one.  Certainly that fragment of the future had never existed before Raziel's most recent paradox.  Kain was interested in avoiding getting nearly-killed by the Seraphan Lord if he could help it. The injuries sustained from that little squabble had set him back 200 years.  He would have to give his younger-self a hint later to never trust Sebastian-the-backstabber further than he could throw the ungrateful wretch.  It would serve the vampire right to have his betrayal flung back in his face.

Still, the ancient vampire remained a bit of a conundrum in the here and now.  Kain looked down at the still-stunned vampire panting on the damp platform.  Audron seemed to be recuperating slowly. The decorative carvings in the stone floor provided ample channels for the water to seep away before it could do more harm to the vampire laying on the surface.  The Reaver's fire seemed to have worked small miracles on restoring the Audron to a reasonable degree of good health.  At least the man's bones seemed to be reassembled and his skin mostly intact.  Idly, Kain wondered if he was expected to bow and show reverence to his supposed 'sire'.  He hadn't last time. But last time he had been an ignorant four-hundred year old jackass on a quest for revenge.  He was supposedly wiser, and older, now. 

Waiting for the blue-skinned ancient to gather his wits, Kain couldn't help but snort in amusement at the idea of obeisance to anyone, even to Audron.  If the old one knew Kain's true feelings and opinions in regards to his long-lost civilization, he'd likely be waiting for the kick to the face.  Smirking, Kain could readily imagine the retaliation he would get, first from his damnably stubborn sword, and then from Vorador, for such a seemingly-random act of violence. Janos might be history's biggest dupe, but he was not solely responsible for Nosgoth's misery.  The ancient seemed to have just been swept along in the current.  The vampire race was hardly without fault, but Audron could not be directly blamed for their monumental mistakes.

His companion seemed content to take it in slow stages. Pushing himself up onto his knees, the blue-skinned vampire was rubbing his head and muttering what sounded like a long string of curses regarding fate and the Hylden.  Kain didn't try to hurry Audron's recovery. He owed him at least that much for the beating the vampire had just barely survived.  Minding his victim's recuperation with morbid interest, he scanned the underbrush for his latest Raziel.  There had been no sign of the knight since he had cut in on the battle.  Other than general optimism, he had no evidence of his lieutenant's continued existence. How ironic it would be, for the vampire to survive a head on fight with a Hash'a'gik, only be butchered by mercenaries in the woods?  It didn't bear thinking about.

Moving on instinct he stooped to grab a hold of an up-thrust elbow as the ancient attempted to rise, guiding Janos to his feet with a minimum of wobbling.

"Thank you, vampire." Janos was clearly still rattled by the last two blows he had taken. One hand pressed against his head, he hissed as he tried to sort out legs and wings. "A moment of patience, if you can bear it?   I seem to be somewhat concussed."

He rubbed his jaw and ran a curious talon over his freely bleeding lip.  "Your prowess is impressive.  I have lived for a millennium, but never have I felt such a blow. A granite block would have had more give." The ancient laughed weakly.

Kain quickly shifted to avoid a feathery collision as Janos struggled to restore equilibrium. The massive wings flapped inadvertently as his companion staggered.  Kain couldn't help but watch in amazement as the unlikely appendages flipped and fluffed damply, just as any bird's wings would.  Up close, the effect was even more impressive than Raziel's earlier aerial acrobatics.  Wings! On vampires! The novelty refused to fade.  He repressed a smile as the vampire settled them gingerly against his back hissing softly at the remaining wet.

Schooling his face to its customary boredom he buffed his claws on his clan-cape.  It wouldn't do to stare like a school boy.  What was important now was to see if this new development could some how be turned in his favor. Kain was hardly about to dismiss an opportunity to gain another ally in his endeavors.  There was a chance after all, that with some careful handling, and attention to nuance, that he could find the necessary leverage to change the future and keep Janos permanently out of the hands of the Hylden.  Or failing that, put him in their hands at a time and place of his choosing. Gauging the bemused expression with which the old vampire was trying to acclimate himself to standing upright, he decided on a gentler approach than his usual.

"Are you sufficiently recovered to spare me a moment?"

The blue-skinned vampire ground the heels of his hands into his eye sockets, and sighed as the pressure relieved some of his pain. "It feels as though I have been struck in the head by a hammer."  The ancient remarked candidly.  "Several hammers."

"My apologies for the headache, Audron. Your strength is considerable, but I rather expect I have had greater opportunities to hone my punches in the past several hundred years.  Had their been another way to convince your captor to let you go, I would not have hit quite so hard." Kain murmured, feeling he ought to offer some sort of sympathy after his spirited efforts to knock the ancient's head off.

"You know me?" Janos Audron gave up on trying to straighten his tattered robe and truly looked at him for the first time.  Mellow golden eyes inspected his face in confusion, then glanced down at the Soul Reaver.  The vampire returned his patient stare with wary respect. "Ah. You must be... the Scion."

Janos drew breath, and let it out in an emotion laden sigh, seeming to sink in on himself as he gave up any pretense of strength.  "How long have I waited for this moment?  So long…"  The vampire bent over until he could brace his hands against his knees, no longer pretending he wasn't still winded and sore from their fight.  "And now that it is here, what is there to say…?"

"I wasn't expecting speeches." Kain snorted.  "It is enough that I am here.  There is much to do."

"Raziel named you Kain." The old vampire smiled weakly and then winced as his split lip reopened. "He was- not well pleased with you when last we spoke."

"He has not been well pleased with much of anything since his resurrection as a wraith." Kain agreed blandly. "But he usually is at his most capable when provoked over something, so I confess I have been goading him a little." 

Janos gave him an odd look. "You are fortunate then, that he sides with you despite the fair grudges he holds."

Kain grinned at the politic phrasing. "Indeed I am. Were Raziel and I to trade places and do it all again, I am certain I would have acted with considerably less grace under pressure."

The ancient's yellow eyes filled with cautious mirth. His color improved with each passing moment.  "Do not take this the wrong way, Kain. But I can easily believe that."

"I will not go down in history for the gentleness of my temper." Kain smirked in agreement.

"I though he was the Scion." Janos confessed after a long moment staring at the ruined Pillars, looking at-a-loss.  "All this time! What a stupid mistake to make!"

"I had all the signs to watch for, and still couldn't see what was in front of my face." He slowly straightened as wounds and bruises healed. Smoothing down his hair and gingerly dusting off his rags he tried to set himself in some semblance of order. "Needless to say, I was a fool."

"I think we have all been navigating as best we could with only half a map." Kain offered in a moment of rare generosity. "The process of uncovering this history of false accusation and misplaced revenge has been frustrating in the extreme for myself as well, I assure you. There are things even now that I have a hunch you are unwitting of..." 

Turning towards the ancient vampire he gestured at the land around them. Despite the general destruction of the Pillars' sanctuary, the woodlands were green and wholesome.  The sky tinted darker as the afternoon grew thin and tired. "I make no claims to holiness, Audron.  That would be a trifle egotistical, even for me. Nor can I boast of innate goodness."

 "What virtue I posses I learned along the way- and poorly too. But for what it's worth, I am the Scion of Balance. If you will just put your faith in me a little longer, I promise you I will endeavor to set all of Nosgoth to rights again."  Kain shook his head at the circular life that had brought him to this moment.

The blue-skinned vampire nodded slowly in agreement. "You are not what I was expecting, Scion. You remind me of Vorador a little.  I suppose there has been too much darkness in this world since the time of the human guardianship.  We have all become a little harder, a bit more jaded.  But I have survived on faith too long now to doubt you. Redeemer and Destroyer- so it was written in the prophesy. In the end it is your choice."

"Not just mine, I assure you." Kain held up the Reaver to give it an ironic look. "I've had a little assistance in order to reach this point."

"Oh." Janos looked at the Reaver's flickering aura, first in confusion, and then in shocked realization. "Oh no. And I had so hoped..."

Kain grimaced. "Damnable fool allowed the blade to consume him in order to restore me, it seems. If you thank anyone for redeeming Nosgoth, it might as well be him. I will not take credit for his share."

"Poor Raziel."  Hesitantly, the ancient reached out to touch the Reaver, not minding the fire that trailed over his fingers.  "The prophesy said nothing about such a sacrifice."

"Perhaps at the time when it was written, there wasn't any need for a sacrifice." Kain mused. "I have often wondered in the past centuries, which came first, the Soul, or the Reaver?"

"I... do not know." Janos blinked at the idea.

"A hypothetical question, I suppose." Kain shrugged. "It isn't as though they are separable now.  For the near future at least, I need the blade intact. But it would be pleasant at some point, to get my idiot-child out."

"Is he still... aware?"

Kain shifted his grip until he held the sword by the curving blade, offering it hilt-first to the vampire who oversaw its creation. "See for yourself."

He was not entirely sure what to expect once the Reaver left his fingers. He had at least nominal confidence that the sword would not be spiteful enough to cleave to the ancient at its bearer in place of him.  Being the Scion of Balance had to count for something in his stubborn child's estimation. Still, he could feel the twitch of concern, and hated himself for his lack of absolute assurance.  He knew with dark certainty that there would be no hesitation in his killing the blue vampire, if it came down to it.  In all other things he was inclined to new-found magnanimity, but the Soul Reaver was his and his alone.

Janos reverently lifted the blade from his fingers.  But the moment the sword left Kain's possession, the prominent aura on the weapon evaporated without trace.  Blinking in surprise, the ancient vampire tilted the sword, closely inspecting the length of the serpentine blade and hilt.  "What did I do? Why does it stop?" 

Janos frowned and concentrated on the blade, clearly attempting to communicate to the presence trapped within.  After a few moments of straining, he shook his head in dismay.  "I can feel nothing.  It is as if the Reaver is as it always was…"

Kain shrugged and reached out to take the weapon back.  He was as confused as Audron by Raziel's reluctance to speak to the vampire he had so stubbornly saved moments before.  In the instant his hands closed over the blade, the Reaver flared to life again. The phantom flames had a desperate feel to them as they coiled tightly over his wrist and up his arm to shoulder height.

He felt the urgency in the thrum along the blade and up through the hilt. Kain closed his eyes, to better understand what it was that his now-silent child was trying to tell him.  The emotion communicated to him through the flames was not at all what he expected. 

Fear.

Looking down again at his sword, Kain could make no sense of it.  The Reaver was afraid, even now.  It seemingly clung to him, as if for reassurance.  Without more explicit words, he had no way to guess what the sword was thinking however.  He shook the blade gently, wondering if it was suffering any lingering after-effects from the fight.

Janos watched the Reaver's antics with concern.  "It seems the weapon is bonded to you, Kain."

"I am the Scion of Balance, after all." Kain stated the obvious.

"I think it may be more than that." The ancient smiled patiently at the reminder, gracefully ignoring the chide.  Raising a hand hesitantly, Janos moved to touch the sword again. "If I may?"

The vampire did much as he had a moment before, closing his eyes and attempting to commune with the evil looking blade. The fires surrounding the Reaver did not quail this time; rather they faded and fanned with a sort of apologetic pulse.  When after a long minute, Janos still seemed content to say nothing, Kain grew impatient.

"And what is your diagnosis?"

"How cruel." The vampire opened his eyes slowly. "That he who was once so proud of his ability with words, should have them taken from him."

"We seem to manage well enough.  I need no speeches to read his meaning." 

Janos gave him a steady look. "I do not blame you, Kain."

"There is nothing to be blamed for." He refused to allow himself to feel defensive.  "The fool brought this on himself."

"For you."

"For Nosgoth." Kain stated flatly.  "I never asked for more than that."

The vampire met his gaze a moment before deliberately looking away, refusing to provoke him further.  Janos was as wise as rumored, at least.  Kain took a calming breath.

Janos held out his hand.  "Give me the sword again, then, if you care so little. I wish to conduct an experiment." 

Sighing at the foolishness of it all, Kain moved to comply, but a jolt up his arm made him pause.  He could almost hear the sword's cry of dismay.  For whatever reason, the Reaver was firmly against his giving it away a second time.  Frowning he tried to make sense of it. 

Trying to communicate with the soul inside the sword intentionally wasn't a trivial exercise.  Like two swimmers desperately trying to join hands in a torrent, he could feel his consciousness and the blade's skirt and impinge on one another, but an actual connection was near impossible. The only impression he was able to take away was one of deep and utter cold, a nothingness that went beyond the absence of touch or sight, to a complete and desolate isolation.  Kain tightened his grip on the weapon instinctively, drawing it back towards him. 

"The sword lives through you."  Audron murmured thoughtfully.  "Without your presence, Raziel does not exist."

Kain tried to rationalize what the vampire was saying. "But that means that every time I put the Reaver down, the fool within is damned to oblivion?"  In a moment of perfect clarity he could see now why it was the Reaver of the past was a maddened and parasitic entity.  How long had it lain abandoned in its shrine until he had come along?  Centuries at least.  No wonder it both clung doggedly to, and yet also hated and consumed its hosts. 

Even as he understood what was at stake, he couldn't help but voice his first perturbed gut reaction.  "What the hell am I supposed to do, take in into the bath with me? Sleep with it?"

"Tell me, Kain. How often, in the past have you let it stray more than an arm's length from your side? Or allowed any other to touch it? For any reason?" The ancient vampire folded his arms across his chest and gave him a disapproving look, not amused by his levity.

"It was too dangerous a weapon to ever let out of my sight." He replied absently as he considered the question.  "Anyone might have taken it up and challenged me with it."

"And that was the only reason?" Janos asked carefully.

"No." Kain conceded. "No, I also-  Liked holding it. It will sound like lunacy, Audron, but it feels comforting in my hand.  Felt comforting.  Even before I knew what it was, what it held within.  Even when the Reaver hungered, or struggled against my will, I felt it belonged to me."

The ancient vampire shrugged, seemingly out of advice.  "I have one or two ideas of how, and even perhaps 'why'. But I do not think it would be right, or fair to Raziel, to test them.  Covet the blade as you have done before, and both you and it will be well served."

"That was my intention all along." Kain murmured, resting both hands on the hilt as he let the blade stand point-down on the platform. He sent it what silent assurance that he could, hoping it understood his concern and forgive him his momentary blunder.  Slowly the hilt warmed again with his touch, the erratic flickering calming to its usual translucent blue nimbus.  Seemingly no harm was done. 

Kain sighed in relief.  Witticism aside, the sword felt more of a burden now than it ever had in his youth.  No longer did he worry about its motivations, or it strength.  Both had been tested and found worthy.  In place of such trivial concerns were his new-found fears for the blade's spiritual wellbeing.  How exactly did one council or comfort a mute ally made of steel?  He had promised Raziel that he would not let history repeat itself. That he would strive to prevent madness from taking hold.  But in the end, did he have any power to stop it?  There had to be a way.  He would just have to exert himself to find it. 

Janos walked slowly towards the back of the platform, politely looking away as Kain regained his countenance. "What happens now, Scion? If you are here, should not the Pillars be restored?  Or is it too late?"

Considering the new topic, Kain turned to considered the cracked and smashed remains of his battleground with Hash'a'gik.  Long shadows gave the ruins an even more mournful look than usual.  He told his subconscious to stop looking for Ariel's spectral form lurking amidst the remaining columns, but old habits were hard to break.  Two of the nine Pillars were almost entirely gone. Most of the rest were mere stumps, even compared with the ruins they had been in his throneroom.  Balance stood nominally upright, taller than the rest, but even it was a shadow of its former glory.  Truly the platform looked the worse for the wear. 

Strangely even in its broken state, the Pillar of Balance called to him.  He could feel its slow, steady power humming in his bones.  All was not yet lost, not so long as a thread of energy remained in the central shaft.  Walking over, he placed his hand upon the sigil and tried to will it to restore itself.  No longer tainted by Nuraptor's madness, he ought to have had the authority to repair the damage or at least commune with the elemental force within.

The monolith refused to respond to his presence with more than a flicker of emotion.  Feeling its confusion, Kain's eyes widened with comprehension.  The Pillar was willing, but unable to accept him as its master.  It didn't know which Kain to listen to, not with two of them blatantly violating the continuum in this age. 

Mind busy trying to determine the best way to resolve the one paradox, he glanced at the Reaver, and was reminded of a second conundrum, equally nightmarish to solve.  Sending one Raziel back to the future was easy enough to accomplish, but there was another buried not twenty miles away.

"Does a corpse count as a paradox, do you think?" He mused aloud.

"How do you mean?"  Janos moved to stand beside him and gave him a confused look. 

Kain shook his head, not having the energy to explain.  One item had been resolved, but the hours were passing quickly for poor Vorador.  There would be no way for him to reach the surly old vampire before his beheading, not without bending time again and risking further interference with his own past.  Kain worried that too much manipulation of the continuum, with everything already a hopeless muddle, could only do more harm than good. 

Besides, there was Audron consider.  The vampire's wings had to be good for something; if his recent battle hadn't damaged them beyond repair.  Looking appraisingly at his companion he decided it was worth asking.  The Reaver seemed to have done a thorough job in patching the ancient back together.  Besides, Janos would have a vested interest in rescuing and reassembling his protégé.  "I don't suppose you could find the stamina to fly?"

"I wouldn't say no to a meal first," the ancient blinked at the change of topic.  "But it seems I am a long way from home."

"There are brigands in the hills." Kain gestured vaguely back down the road leading to the Pillars. "Take as many as you like. These times seem to perpetually breed more."

"What other choices do desperate men have when armies crush both friend and foe in these so-called crusades." The vampire shook his head sadly. "I swore an oath long ago, never shall I drink from one unwilling, never from a living creature at all, if a better option presents."

"Vorador's body lies cooling on a slab in Avernus, awaiting some final and potentially permanent indignity… and you would dither in rescuing him due to moral quandary?" He couldn't keep the contempt entirely from his voice.  "You truly are the foolish one, aren't you."

"Vorador is dead?"  Janos stared at him is slack-jawed dismay. "How? How could this be?!"

"Mobius."  Kain spat. "Conniving bastard caught and beheaded the poor fool in revenge for his killing spree amongst the Seraphan knights and Guardians a few centuries ago.  Ironically, Vorador was motivated at the time by your own death at the hands of the Seraphan brotherhood." He shrugged. "Behold, the circle of life." 

"I cannot believe it." Janos shook his head, stunned. "Not Vorador."

"Go and see for your self then." Kain goaded grimly. "It's a short distance, as the crow flies. And plenty of human cattle to pick from should you get peckish along the way."

 "I refuse to become a slave to bloodlust." Janos vowed, just as firmly.  "I have not lived this long just to fall into the old trap now.  A man is defined by his actions in this world.  I have always believed it. I will always believe."

"You didn't live this long at all." Kain snapped back, irritated already by the blue-skinned vampire's pacifism. "You've been laying like a slab of meat with a missing heart these several hundred years because of your damned inability to adapt to reality."

"And what reality is this?"

Kain grimaced and sheathed the Reaver across his shoulders. "I speak of the reality that there are some people in this world who simply need killing."

"All life is precious, Scion." Janos protested.

"You keep thinking that, Audron, if it gives you comfort." Pointing to the east, he gestured at the darkening sky.  The sun already hung low on the horizon.  "Vorador is that way, if you can be bothered to save him. It is no skin off my back either way.  Follow the road north of here for a short while and you will come to a fork.  In the embankment above there will be a cave.  The blood fountain contained within may appeal to your delicate sensibilities."

The ancient vampire looked first towards the sun and then toward the road behind them in surprise.  Bowing his head he sounded suitably humbled, "Thank you, Kain."

"Don't thank me, just go retrieve Vorador. I have a hunch he'll be useful later." He waived off the earnest words.

Catching the old vampire as he stretched out his still tattered looking wings, he recalled one last warning. "There will be a rather irate young vampire bound and muffled towards the back of the cave. Do not on any account help him, I have plans for him later and don't want to have to run him down when I need him."

Janos gave him another baffled stare, but blessedly didn't question. With a rustling rush of feathers he threw himself into the air and laboriously gained altitude.  Kain watched a moment to make sure the vampire was heading in roughly the correct direction.  He had played his only reasonable card for Vorador.  He wished the pair of them luck, but their final outcome wasn't his top priority.  His new Raziel still hadn't put in an appearance. It behooved him to check to see if the knight hadn't magnified his predecessor's paradox by doing something as damn foolish as dying in the past, again.

The last of the day's light was streaming through the trees as Kain made his way through the initial underbrush.  It caught on the wings of insects as they flittered about, and made ghosts of the bits of pollen settling on the breeze.  Not for the first time, he was enchanted by the richness of Nosgoth's life, here in the past.  The shadow of the Pillar's corruption was barely detectible yet, nothing more than a sort of flavor on the wind, hinting at darkness to come.  But for now at least the world was fruitful, golden-green and humming with self-satisfied decadence. 

Raziel's trail was not all together difficult to follow. Damaged feathers had stuck here and there amidst the broken twigs and leaves.  The rich smell of the vampire's blood hinted at his passage even where the trail was less visible.  Gamely following the wounded knight's path, Kain found himself trekking deep into the forest, over a small brook and finally to a gnarled monster of a tree.

His lieutenant looked to be fast asleep where he sat half propped against the warty old trunk.  Head tilted back, cradled between the base of one of his smoky wings and the solid bulk of the tree, Raziel paid no mind to the sunset as he rested.  Here and there Kain could see evidence of the knight's efforts, his outer layers of robe, surcoat, and shirt pulled off into a messy heap, strips of the soiled rags shredded into bandages for his bare chest and arms.  Of his priestly costume only his sword remained, the elegant weapon resting across his thighs as if he expected his rest interrupted.

For a moment Kain was tempted to let the man sleep. While looking far better than earlier, it was clear the fight had taken its toll on the vampire.  Studying Raziel's wings he noted how the drying blood had clumped and matted a wide swath of feathers along the one, several feathers missing from the clean row at the edge.  Other than the bloodstains, the vampire seemed in decent shape.  He wavered between hunting up a light snack for his future-child, or simply rousing him for a return to the cave.  Given the vampire in question, using the Reaver to heal him was simply out of the question. 

In the end the cave won out.  The blood fountain's restorative properties would do more for his wounded companion than a mortal's life-force could.  Kain sighed, remembering that couldn't leave his younger self unsupervised much longer, whatever his plans were. There was no telling what the foolish vampire would get up to, bound hand-to-foot or not. 

He crossed the distance between them on cat's feet, crouching so as to not cast a shadow across the sleeping vampire.  It was far easier to appreciate the similarities between this Raziel and his own while the knight lay unawares.  Kain drank in the sight of the familiar profile for a long moment, saving the memory against darker times.

"Raziel."  Not wanting to startle the vampire, he called his name before nudging his shoulder. 

His new Raziel shared the old one's habit of abrupt awakenings.  Suddenly alert, the knight clenched his sword and tensed to strike on instinct. Kain easily encased the weapon's hilt, and the hand holding it, in his own steady grip. "Be calm, child."

"Lord Scion."  Gathering his wits, Raziel greeted him with unnecessary reverence. "You are victorious?"

"Indeed," he drawled mildly, releasing his protective grip on his lieutenant's weapon.  "Audron has been dealt with satisfactorily. Your injuries?"

"As well as can be expected."  Raziel had the grace to look embarrassed by his weakness.  "I am fit for duty, my lord"

"You're exhausted." Kain disagreed, easily doing his own assessment. "And half-starved.  A bandit could have made quick work of you just now. This time is rife with would-be Seraphan.  It isn't wise to let your guard down."

"Even as I am, they would have found me more sport than they bargained for, noble sire." Raziel disagreed calmly. "I would not dishonor you by falling easily to mere human rabble."

Rubbing his face, Kain couldn't help himself, "I don't suppose you could dispense with the constant obsequiousness, child?  It does tend to grate on a person during prolonged conversations."

"My Lord?"

"Kain." He corrected, somewhat amused by his lieutenant's failure to immediately comply.  "You may call me Kain.  It is what I am accustomed to, from you."

"So informal?" The handsome vampire wondered aloud.  "Have we always been thus, in your world?"

"For the majority of our time together, yes." Kain nodded, and then smirked evilly. "There was some… unpleasantness between us in the recent past, and for a time you took to calling me an assortment of even less formal names. But I would appreciate it if you called me Kain."

"How remarkable."  Raziel used the trunk of the tree as a sort of crude prop, leveraging it and his sword to get back onto his feet.  "I do not know if I will be able to manage it, Kain.  My lord was never well pleased with informality, and habit is not always easy to overcome."

Collecting the bundle of bloody clothing from where it lay on the grass, Kain stood slowly, minding his companion's pained progress. "Try for my sake." 

"As you wish, my lord."  The vampire immediately winced at his slip.

"Are you up for a bit of walking?" Kain asked instead of scolding further.  Seeing the nod of agreement, he set them back on track to intercept the road, not minding the half light.  "First we will find you some nourishment. Then we shall speculate on what is best to be done next."

Any bandits lying in wait along the dusky road let them pass without confrontation.  Whether it was the menacing flicker of the Reaver blade's aura, or his companion's unearthly wings that was the deciding factor, Kain was unable to guess.  He couldn't honestly complain at the humans' sudden burst of self-preserving instinct.  After all that had happened since dawn he found he was sick to death of fighting.  Having no injuries to boast of, Kain could only blame the constant shocks of the past twenty-four hours for his fatigue.  So many secrets revealed; so little time to unravel the hidden meanings before he was forced to act.

Too tired to even pretend to lie to himself, he found he sorely missed his old lieutenant's company.  Kain could have used the distraction of his favorite's sharp tongued critiques.  The new Raziel pacing along softly at his side was far too respectful to interrupt his thoughts as the old one often delighted in doing.

Glancing sideways, Kain silently appraised his new lieutenant's condition, glad that they were nearly at their destination.  The knight looked visibly worn down, face drawn and pale as he followed, not even seemingly aware of the rising moon above them.  So subdued, the passive posture didn't suit the vampire at all.  Kain wondered what sort of life his lieutenant had lived to turn him into such a docile creature.

"It'll be a mile yet."  He caught the winged vampire's attention. "Do you need to rest?"

Blinking slowly, Raziel surfaced from his own meditations only to shake his head.  "I would not slow you down."

"It'll slow me down considerably more if you collapse." Kain replied dryly.  "With those wings, I confess I have no proper idea of how one might carry you."

Apparently the very idea was offensive to his new subordinate.  Raziel's feathers visibly fluffed outwards in anxiety.  "I would not expect it, lord."

"Kain."  He corrected firmly, feeling the loss of his erstwhile son more than before.  There was just something so terribly dull about the new one.

"Kain."  Raziel sighed apologetically, following a step behind him.

Soon enough they came to the split in the highway.  Kain wasted no time in leaping from ledge to ledge on the fractured hillside leading up to the cave's mouth, glancing back once at the top to make sure his ally was not too far behind.  Raziel's movements were far from graceful. Dressed in the tatters of his uniform, the vampire refrained from using wings in favor of hands and feet, hauling himself up the crumbled cliff side to join him at the top. 

Kain reached down as the knight fumbled for the last hand-hold.  Wordlessly catching the grasping fingers in his own steady grip, he pulled the lieutenant to the safety of the ledge.  Looking down at the earnest gratitude apparent on his replacement child's face Kain resisted the urge to snarl in annoyance.  He turned instead to the shadowy interior of the cavern, leaving the vampire to sort himself out. "Feed yourself while I tend to matters."

The blood welling from the earth refreshed and revived, as it always did.  For the second time in hours, Kain braced his arms against the low lip of the pool and tried to clear his head.  Moonlight did little to illuminate the cave proper, but there was an occult fire trickling along the cracks in the walls and from atop the fountain's carved pedestals that served well enough.  A human might have been crowded by the darkness, but a vampire could navigate easily enough.  He tilted his head slightly, noting the quiet fastidiousness with which his lieutenant fed.  There would be no trouble from that corner at least.  The creature was obedient to a fault.  Kain pushed himself upright again and followed a natural gap in the cavern's wall into a deeper corner of the cave.  No more than two steps into the room, and he hissed in heart-felt annoyance.  Of course nothing would ever be easy, even this close to his goal.  He should have known, really.

Crouching down, Kain picked up the frayed pile of rope left on the floor.  Other than a few strands of white hair, and the stirred up dust on the floor, the room was entirely unoccupied. 

A quick glance proved that both the fledgling's pack, and sword, had vanished with him.  Whether by Janos' hand or another ally, or some occult means yet to be discovered, his young copy had flown the coop while he was delayed.  "Damn the idiot."  Feeling older than ever, Kain stood, fingering the tattered evidence between his claws as he suppressed the urge to grind his teeth.  There was no telling what the young version of himself would get up to.  He had no delusions about his former gullibility.  Egomaniac as he had been as a youth, he would make easy pickings for one such as the squid underground, or even the Hylden. 

The Reaver flared sympathetically against his shoulder.  Kain spared it a soothing thought. As poor of a consolation as it was, at least the young fool hadn't run off with his favored blade.  Had the vampire taken him up on his offer to trade, Kain wasn't entirely certain if he could have found the fortitude to just walk away and leave the Soul Reaver with a new master; even if that new master was himself.  Frustrated, he punched the wall of the cave, the stone unyielding beneath his fist, neither capable of truly hurting the other.

The last thing he had wanted was to waste time tramping across country in order to flush out his former-self as causality and Nosgoth both crumpled around him.  Fate it seemed, wasn't in a listening mood.  Still, standing around uselessly would hardly help matters.  Kain reached out with his will even as he navigated the narrow passage back to the fountain, searching the nearby landscape for the runaway.  Either the fledgling was hidden, or far beyond his ability to see.  He cursed again.

"Kain?"  Raziel was sitting on the convenient lip of the blood pool, wings held carefully aloft and away from the spray as new feathers grew in.  "You look-  Is something amiss?"

He schooled his expression back from murderous at the sight of the vampire's alarmed look.  "He's escaped."

"Who's escaped?"  Raziel blinked, trying to fathom the source of his ire.

Kain settled on the fountain's edge with a hiss. "Kain. I left him here. But he's since absented himself, no doubt Janos' doing.  Soft hearted idiot."

"The Adversary is soft hearted?"  The vampire rolled his shoulders, stretching his wings to settle his feathers. "That I find hard to believe."

"The adversary is no more." Kain corrected grimly.  "I detangled the Dark Entity from the vampire. The one is banished.  The other is turning out to be a nuisance."

Raziel silently digested the commentary.  Catching sight of the tattered rope dangling from Kain's hand, he reached out to claim it, curious.  Kain snorted in amusement as the knight turned the clue over in his claws, trying to puzzle out its meaning.  First toying with the frayed end, and then sniffing it. The vampire frowned in thought.  "I don't know if I entirely understand you, master, but I don't think there was outside interference with this.  It seems whoever was tied up chewed their way free."

"It was Kain."  He repeated himself, accepting the rope back from his puzzled companion with grim humor.  "I suppose I wouldn't put it past him."

"Wait." Raziel held up a hand. "Are you saying, Kain, as in, another Kain? Not you?"

"The Kain of this era. Yes."  Kain rubbed his forehead.  "Damn fool's run off somewhere. Sulking no doubt."

"You?" The dark haired knight was looking at him in dismay. "You bound and gagged yourself?!"

"Your semantics are a little confused. But yes."  Kain smirked and rested his elbows on his knees. "I met the one who was supposed to fight Audron, here.  He proved… obstinate.  So I left him here to rethink his options while I followed you.  It seems now I underestimated him.  He was even more obstinate than I gave him credit for, and more resourceful as well."

"He is you after all."  Raziel offered a half smile.  "But what now?  Isn't the moment of danger past? Shouldn't we leave him to get on with his life unmolested?"

"I'm not sure." Kain mulled over what he knew, and what he didn't.  The vampire had an excellent point.  How much was he supposed to deflect from his youthful self before he altered history in a way unintended?  All he knew for certain was that the Pillars were not yet restored, and that event was not likely to occur until he both purified the other Kain, and either absented himself from this era, or more likely, died.  He spoke slowly as he put his thoughts in order. "There is at least one power left in this world that is currently bent on destroying him; an ancient being that lurks in secrecy deep beneath the ground."

"Must we fight that for him as well?"  Raziel craned his neck and bent his wings, inspecting himself.  Kain watched, mildly impressed at the way the vampire was able to reach back and catch his wingtip, guiding the appendage closer so as to finger-comb the dried blood off of his feathers.  "If it is so ancient, how is it that no one knows about it?"

"It exists in a manner that is only partially perceivable to the senses.  It is a creature of the spirit realm, but no less real for its insubstantiality."  Unable to help himself he reached out and caught the wing's leading edge after watching his lieutenant struggle to hold the awkward pose and take care of what ever it was he was attempting to do. 

Not sure what he had been expecting, Kain was startled at the feeling of coiled strength beneath the palm of his hand.  The feathered limb was as real and solid as Raziel's arm would have been.  What he had mistaken for frail, downy softness was only the outer most layer. Just beneath the surface the warm contour of sinewy muscle was oddly reassuring. The memory of the feel of his old Raziel's wings beneath his fingers followed close behind.  Gossamer smooth and just as fragile beneath his claws, his former lieutenant's bat-like evolution had been undeniably beautiful in its way.  Not that he had allowed it to last long.   Tearing this Raziel's wings out would require considerably more effort, even if he could muster the stomach for it.  Given the amount of blood likely contained in the massive arteries feeding the vampire's appendages, losing one abruptly would probably be deadly. 

Closing his hand carefully over the feathers Kain checked the limb's motion, freeing up Raziel to dig his claws into the thick down of the short feathers without having to struggle with maintaining his balance.  "Do you need assistance?" He watched with the vampire's efforts with interest.

"If you could be patient just one moment… One of the damned things is impacted and the itching will drive me crazy if I don't-" Raziel hissed and itched at a patch of new growth, finally getting his claw tips around a broken looking shaft.  He yanked at the offending feather, pulling it out with a wince. "Aaaah."

"Perils of molting?"  Kain couldn't help but jibe, curious in spite of himself as he let go.

"You have no idea." The knight replied, candid for once. Turning the bit of feather over in his fingers he made a face and cast it aside.  "There are always one or two that don't come in right after an injury."  Standing, he moved to the cave door, beating his wings briskly against the air as soon as room permitted, craning his neck as he stretched one at a time to complete his visual inspection.  One last ruffle, and they were folded discretely against his back.  The antics couldn't help but make Kain think of hunting hawks fussing on their keeper's fists. 

"It seems you are once again in order." Kain observed dryly.

"As fit as can be, all things considered." His lieutenant nodded, looking much more alert than previously.  Spying his tattered gear still in a pile, the dark haired vampire crouched to pick through the remains, donning the tattered undershirt and mail armor with practiced dexterity, despite the wings.  

Raziel looked up as he tightened the laces at his waist. "So what do we do?  Find this ephemeral creature underground? Or track your younger self?"

"I think finding Kain will be the imperative act."  Kain frowned.  "I dare not leave the youth to his own devices, not when the Pillars are yet broken."  Tilting his head back, he brushed the Reaver's hilt with the side of his face. "Besides. There is the matter of the Soul Reaver that still must be settled.  There is only the one blade.  If it is to be his, he must be convinced to take it up and fulfill his destiny."

"I was always taught that the Pillars were restored as soon as the Adversary was defeated." Raziel mused. "Another exaggeration, I wonder."

"Or an alteration in the course of history." Kain grimly replied.  "We must work quickly, child, or you may become just as stranded as I in this timeline, with no future of your own to go back to."

Raziel paled at the idea. "Is such a thing possible?"

"Oh yes." Kain eyed the moon to judge the hour, feeling oddly depressed at the thought.  He hadn't loved his future particularly. The desolate and ruined countryside had been a constant reminder of his failure as Balance Guardian. But it had been his in a way this fruitful world never could be.  And it was lost to him, forever, in the moment Raziel fulfilled his destiny.

 This world, and its happier future, was all that remained.  Most of him was well pleased with the developments, even if it stung to admit that it belonged to another Kain, a younger one.  His victory had turned him into a sort of living ghost.  No longer belonging in this timeline, or any other, he couldn't lay claim to any of it, not the sword on his back, nor even the man at his side. 

He had had his chance, and used -perhaps squandered- it to the best he was able, now it was this young Kain's turn.  Hoping the fledgling would appreciate the sacrifices made so that he could have an easier time of it was futile.  The boy neither knew nor cared, nor could he be expected to.  Regrets and fancies aside, there could be only one Kain.  He chided himself against the idle wish that he would be that one again.

"Yes it is very possible to become stranded."  He murmured.  "And should that unfortunate event occur… your likelihood of survival is rather slim."

 "Yet you live." His lieutenant pointed out gently.

"For now." Kain agreed.  He took a slow breath to settle his frustrations. "Fate it seems, is not quite done with me yet.  We shall have to endeavor to return you to your proper time before things get too out of hand, though.  It makes no sense for you to suffer the same trap if you do not need to."

The wind from the east carried with it the scent of heavy rain.  He looked back at the relative comfort of the cave and then out onto the moonlit highway.  Raziel was no doubt old enough to endure a mild wetting, should they be caught out when the storm struck, and he himself was categorically immune to all but the worst downpours.  It made no sense to idly waste time when there was prey to catch.  He reached out, habitually, and squeezed his lieutenant's shoulder with old affection as he hopped off the ledge. "Come, let us hunt."

Jumping down onto the road, he missed Raziel's look of startled pleasure completely. 


	4. Chapter 4

Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King

(A continuation fan-fiction for Legacy of Kain: Defiance)

/../- implies vampiric 'whisper' a.k.a. telepathy/mental projection.

The Soul Reaver isn't capable of speech as such, but I gave it dialog anyway to show that Kain can interpret its wordless snark without difficulty? I have no idea. Just go with it.

**The End: Chapter 4-**

The scent of the missing vampire led Kain easily towards the nearest town despite the long delay. Rather than making any pretense at stealth, the fledgling seemed to have opted for haste. The trail cut through the woods and crossed the next highway to the east, then turned northerly, following the road. With the weather turning, Kain did not see a need to second guess. The need for shelter would be far more pressing for the young one than for himself. The boy had no choice if he didn't want to get soaked but to click his heels and bolt for the nearest little village. How predictable.

Mindful of his companion's recent recuperation, Kain slowed his pace once he was confident of the route, conserving his energy for when it was needed. The wind from the east was heavy with damp. Trees and long summer grasses bent and swayed with the fitful gusts. He eyed the cloud banks in the distance, reading the promise of a wild night to come. They had best be done with their hunt before the storm made things uncomfortable. Gesturing to Raziel to follow, he turned off the road well before the village and cut through the woods. Time was short, it wouldn't do to get bogged down by some foolishly reactionary humans if it could be avoided.

Nachtholm, the village of bridges, was almost pretty when bathed with starlight. Small clusters of thatched huts were spread out over a series of three swampy islands at the edge of a lake. Wooden walkways spanned the still waters, their sturdy pilings driven deep into the mud of the lake bed. The whole of the village was illuminated by regularly spaced torches tied to the stockades. Still more of the sooty brands were carried by the scattering of watchmen as they sleepily patrolled. The majority of the peasants still awake were gathered in the crude square in front of the tavern, laughing, talking and watching the coming storm. Despite the hour, the tavern looked to be popular, golden lamplight and faint music spilling out of the unshuttered windows.

Kain sat on his heels on the escarpment overlooking the little settlement, dredging long abandoned memories of the basic layout of the buildings from the depths of his tired brain. There were tunnels connecting the cellars that allowed a person to avoid walking the streets between certain buildings. It was a clever ploy, Kain conceded. A necessary invention contrived by villagers that lived in a region often prone to bandit raids, army pillage, and feral vampires. In the years not beset by turmoil, the passages doubled as a convenient hidey-hole for anything they didn't want the taxman to find. The tunnels would no doubt hold appeal for the fledgling he sought. Young Kain would appreciate the dark cozy spaces beneath the town for laying low through a storm. Kain shook his head at his youthful predictability. He felt more than saw Raziel settle silently beside him, preoccupied by the view. The vampire moved well, even with the added bulk of his wings to hamper him. Kain was thankful for his silence as he debated with himself whether to lure the fledgling out, or to go in after him.

He hadn't thought about Nachtholm in centuries. The sleepy hamlet was not the sort of place that inspired nostalgia. Black flies and mosquitoes made the place a misery in the summer. In the winter the wind swept across the lake and froze a man to the bone. Even its so-called Public House was little better than a barn full of kegs with a long counter to sup at. Weary travelers who risked the crude 'inn' in the side room slept with one eye open for fear of cut-purses in the night. It was hardly a memorable place, save for to the people who called it home. Kain shook his head at the strange games fate played. In the end even they forgot about it.

The centuries to come would see a change in the general climate, for one reason or another. The whole area would begin to flood annually as the lakes of the region over-filled with rain. Eventually the islands would become so waterlogged that the citizens would be forced to abandon their village in search of higher ground. For now at least, the little thatched community seemed to be thriving. Watching the settlement with eagle eyes, he could easily survey the entire cluster of island-bound hovels. Prowling about the place however was another thing entirely.

As a young vampire he had passed readily for a human with only a minor glamour to disguise the obvious. Instead of a pale, fanged, yellow eyed fiend, he could compel the weak minds of humans around him to see him as a fellow serf of some sort or a wandering nobleman. It had often seemed that no two saw him exactly the same, but it had hardly mattered. A side effect of the enchantment was to make him so unremarkable in appearance that half his observers forgot he had passed by as soon as he was out of sight. It had been a fragile magic however, easily seen through by the sensitive, or by anyone witnessing him doing something outside the ordinary.

After two millennia or more of evolution however, there was little left of him that wasn't out of the ordinary. He highly doubted the simple magic trick he used as a boy would still have any effect. Even if he could disguise himself, it would take a far greater illusion still to mask Raziel's obvious abnormalities. On consideration, Kain wondered if perhaps they might be an advantage after all. The vampire was still plenty beautiful despite being past his first ten centuries, and the wings added a rather mythic appeal.

The Seraphan had worshiped winged-beings as their avatars, had they not? If those cutthroats had been completely ignorant of exactly what race those wings belonged to, the local peasantry couldn't be any different. How ironic, to worship winged beings of grace and nobility with one breath, and butcher their descendants in the next. Ignorance truly was bliss. Kain shook his head.

The idea of sending Raziel into the center of town as some winged' messiah and demanding that the dull fools all turn out their attics and henhouses in search for a vampire nearly made him laugh out loud. It was simply too risky however. With his torn and tattered shirt and mail, the vampire didn't look much like anyone's divine messenger. Not unless such things made a habit of getting rolled by outlaws for their purse on the highway. He snorted again at the thought.

Raziel looked over at him with his first noise of amusement, but didn't seem to be able to guess his thoughts. Kain was half tempted to tell him, wondering if he would be as cynically entertained as his former-lieutenant doubtless would have been. But staring at the knight's guileless features he merely shook his head. The joke wouldn't be as amusing if it had to be explained.

"Any idea of how we are to get the youth out?" The dark haired vampire looked over at the town. Men with torches patrolled the footpath leading up to the bridges, capable of lowering them into the water at the first sign of danger. Building onto the lake was strategic, as stupid as it first appeared, especially when it was the dead, more than the living, which were to be feared. Kain speculated at being able to vault the distance, certain his lieutenant could simply fly over.

The thought held more appeal than any plan thus far. He gestured towards the largest of the three islands. "Can you cause a distraction towards that end of town, do you think?"

"Mischief, mayhem, or massacre?" Raziel raised an eyebrow inquisitively.

Kain shook his head at the vampire's clever tongue. Some things never changed. This child might be tamer than the last, but he had the same flippant streak when inclined.

"Mischief, I should think." He smirked. "Nothing permanently damaging. These people have already had to deal with one Kain this evening. Two would simply be too unfair."

"Do you often sympathize with peasants?" The dark haired vampire looked at him with genuine surprise.

"Does not your Kain?" He frowned. He didn't consider himself a paragon of equality, Balance Pillar aside, but he at least could respect the purpose of such tiny settlements as these. Serfs had to have somewhere to live unmolested. Otherwise they were too busy being miserable and homeless to work effectively. And then how were they to be of any use to anyone?

"I- couldn't say." Raziel looked across the small lake, pondering the question. "I suppose he does, but I've only ever heard of him speak of it in abstracts. He has never held back his hand when doing otherwise was more convenient. There are always more humans."

Kain smiled at the cold practicality. It was certainly true. Humans had a remarkable knack of finding a way to breed and populate. Even in the extreme future he had once called home, the humans had managed to eke out a living, even when there was hardly anything but crows left to eat. But this Nosgoth was so gentle, and relatively pristine, it seemed a shame to commit unnecessary atrocity. Glancing back at the town, he grimly acknowledged that such quibbles were entirely alien to the creature he hunted.

"Get going." He gestured. "No fire. But try to draw as many guards as you can to that end of the village without getting caught."

"Please." Raziel protested quietly. "Have some faith in my ability, Scion. I can fly, you realize."

"And they have short-bows." Kain replied, rising from his crouch. "Don't do anything I'm bound to regret."

"Aye, my lord." The vampire replied drolly. At least the knight's need to grovel was wearing off with practice, even if Raziel couldn't help but forget to omit the titles.

"Kain." He corrected in an undertone as the vampire took flight. His lieutenant probably couldn't hear it over the beat of his own wings. For a moment Kain feared the sound would give them away, but once over the water, his ally was able to stretch himself in the air and twist slowly upwards, seeming to ride an invisible current higher with silent grace. Had the vampire worn more discrete clothing, he'd have been nothing but a dark blur against the night sky. As it was, it would take a remarkably astute human to think to look up. Even if they did, they probably wouldn't be able to puzzle out the meaning of the glimmers of reflected torch light on chain mail overhead.

Creeping down towards the bridge, Kain checked that the Soul Reaver was comfortably settled on his back. Leaping onto the bridge itself was problematic. He knew his weight well enough to guess that colliding with the fragile trestles at speed would likely cause quite a commotion, doubly so if the wood failed to hold, and proceeded to drop him into the lake. His sword might not feel kindly enough to protect him from water a second time if he were to immerse himself as a result of his own stupidity. Picking his way along the shore, he lined up a marginally safer landing point behind one of the pole-framed huts and dug his claws into the soft earth, waiting for the guards to look away.

With the clouds skirting across the moon it was hard to say where his lieutenant had flittered off to, but he was willing to give the vampire a few minutes. Just as the damp started to make itself known to his toes, an unearthly scream erupted from the far side of the village. The weirdly echoing wail carried out over the water, seeming to grow louder as it traveled. The men guarding the bridge cringed and stared in horror. Even Kain felt a shiver down the length of his spine, not so much in fear, as in response to the odd harmonics the wail carried with it. The noise was making itself felt in his bones.

"Banshee!" One of the guardsmen cried out, grabbing a torch and running towards the sound. Lights emerged from several darkened windows and doors banged open and shut in the darkness. Kain chose his moment and jumped. Big though he was, he cleared the expanse of water easily, landing with a heavy grace on the grass on the other side. Standing quickly and sinking into the shadows that along the wall of the building, he couldn't help but cringe again as a second wail, even louder than the first, set his teeth on edge. It certainly sounded like a banshee. How Raziel was managing it was a mystery. Some unknown talent the boy developed in an alternate future perhaps? It seemed an odd skill to cultivate.

He counted the rushing footsteps behind him and grinned. The last of the bridge keepers had gone to help his brothers. Kain softly crossed the open space between the buildings and crouched to the road, finding the trail of scent he sought. The other Kain had waltzed right into the center of the village without trouble. His glamour kept him safe from unwanted attention, especially in the half light of dusk. But where did the fledgling wander to after that? Keeping an eye out for the returning guards, he followed the scent to a brighter lit patch of the village, and ducked around a stack of barrels when confronted with the worried crowd. He ignored the debating townsmen in favor of exploring the empty taproom. A drunk dozed fitfully in one corner; a ghost shivered and peered about from another.

The barman like the others was outside discussing the odd noise, but the secret passage to the cellar was easily apparent. He crossed over to the door, but hesitated, turning to the ghost instead. Sometimes sense could be gotten from the newly-dead, if one had the patience to put up with the wailing. "You. Woman." He sat on his heels in front of the sniffling specter.

"N-no! More monsters!" The transparent girl raised her hands as if to ward him off. "Please… please don't hurt me."

"Answer a question and I will leave you in peace." Kain replied gently. "The one who killed you, was a vampire, yes? How long ago did he arrive?"

"He was dressed like a lord." The girl wiped at her eyes as she wept insubstantial tears. "But he wasn't! He asked me to bring him a drink outside, I thought- He said I was pretty! But my poor mum will wonder when I don't come home, she will."

"Did you see any companions?"

"No." The ghost placed her hands against her face. "No, there was no one else. Please leave me alone."

"As you wish." Kain saw no point to harassing the ghost further, likely she would find her peace by morning. Crossing the room, he ducked through the hidden passage before the men could resume their drinking, stepping down the musty steps into the store room beneath. His nose easily identified an assortment of foodstuffs and ales, along with the recent passage of another vampire. But the overarching scent was one of dank mildew. Kain frowned, following the narrow passage. He had no memory of there being flooding in this era.

The passage was supposed to lead up to the back of the elder's house, but the scent trail detoured to a stack of crates he'd never noticed on previous visits. Kain stared at them perplexed. To be fair, it had been a long time, a very long time, since he had last wandered the streets of Nachtholm, but as a fledgling he had been fairly familiar with the tiny burgh. Pulling the boxes aside, he hissed as he felt the mud seeping over his feet. Yet the fledgling's scent continued down the newly revealed passage. The younger vampire ought to have been repulsed by even the idea of damp. Perhaps he'd misted across the obstacle? Kain did much the same, rematerializing on a slightly dryer patch of floor, but the presence of water all around made the hairs on the back of his neck stand.

The tunnel shifted from mud to stone as it descended, the smell of water growing stronger with every pace. It sweated from the rocky walls and oozed into muddy puddles on the floor. Kain stooped to wedge himself into an even smaller stretch of tunnel easily detecting the booted footprint of his prey leading forward into the darkness. He could almost feel the weight of the water above and around him, for no doubt he was now beneath the lake. Suddenly worried about Raziel, he wondered if the knight had the sense to realize he would be absent a while and make himself scarce, or if he would attempt to follow like an idiot. There was no way the winged vampire would be able to wedge into this tight space, even if he wanted to.

Kain sighed in acute relief when the tunnel's trend turned ascending. Moving with silent caution, he picked his way through the cramped space, feeling more optimistic with each step towards the surface. He had no true idea of where they would likely emerge. Beyond the town, certainly, but he did not think the tunnel stretched as far as the great lake to the east.

In the distant future the two lakes had swelled and become one. A massive earthquake would later rock the region, reshaping the whole of the lowlands and creating a permanent vortex at the center of the new lake. The Lake of Tears, was the water's current ill-omen'ed name, so called because of the grieving wives of countless fishermen who drowned there. In a sudden burst of memory he recalled hearing about the freak storms which arose over the water on a regular basis, as a youth. And the common rumors of monsters in the deep. Kain suddenly had a grim suspicion about the exact nature of those 'monsters'. After all, in the future the body of water had been known simply as the Lake of the Dead.

Not for the first time, did he wish he could ask his Raziel a few clarifying questions. Such a pity, that the resident-expert in the area of the false-god's ways was prematurely silenced by his voluntary prison. Tilting his head to brush against the carved hilt, he felt a soothing burst of warmth from the blade. The Reaver was as attentive as it could be, given the circumstances. Focusing his thoughts, he tried to formulate the simple question.

"Was the beast there in the lake? When you- fell?"

_Fell?_

The sword's aura flickered, suddenly icy against his spine. Kain closed his eyes against a lifetime of regret. Raziel might have been inclined to forgive him for his bald-faced betrayal, but it was much too soon to expect him to forget it. "It was necessary, child."

The Soul Reaver flickered weirdly, sending shadows chasing each other down the narrow tunnel, but its aura was bitter as bad blood.

"The creature was there." Kain confirmed to himself, suddenly sickened by the idea of the squid-like entity squatting at his doorstep and laughing at his blindness all those years.

His blade grudgingly relented, perhaps sensing his unspoken guilt. _It needs water. _

The faint after image of enormous tentacles reaching up through the surface of an underground lake, glistening in weird torchlight, came to Kain. He hissed at the undertones of anger and defeat that clung to the memory. Whatever the creature had done to his lieutenant, the vampire's spirit was still troubled by it.

_It exists everywhere._ The sword shivered against him again as if disgusted. Half a dozen images danced briefly behind his eyes, all with the same theme. Rippling water, underground caverns filled with ancient artifacts, hundreds of tentacles twined around and through watery grottoes, and eyes; strange, bulbous eyes peering out from the dark depths of the world. Positioned without rhyme or reason, they stared in all directions at once, frog-like pupils dilating as they studied the murky currents and astral creatures. The nightmarish quality of many of the impressions left a Kain feeling cold.

He mulled the cryptic emanations over as he resumed his chase. Dwelling on the monsters that lurked in the bowels of the earth, while standing in a lake-bed tunnel, seemed a supremely foolish thing to do. Fresh air was suddenly far more tempting than previously. He could smell the change as much as see it, open air was just ahead. Kain quickened his pace, eager to recover the surface.

When he caught up with the mental-defective he had once been, he was going to box the fledgling's ears for gross stupidity.

--

The stormy breeze tickled his nose as he emerged from a cluster of boulders onto the bank of the lake. Kain sighed as the cramped anxiety of the tunnel was forgotten. He turned to get his bearings and shrugged at the sameness of the scene. He was still at the shore of Nachtholm's little lake it seemed, but on the far side. Either an escape route, or a smuggler's path; likely the tunnel was both. But it had brought him in a fairly straight course through to the opposite bank, under the reedy shallows that surrounded the islands. To his right the lake swelled and deepened to an unknown degree, allowing the fishermen to trawl their nets for the oily eels that they favored. Kain had never seen the appeal. Turning back to the village, he couldn't make out any sign of commotion. Raziel had presumably made good his escape, although where the vampire had wandered off to was anyone's guess. The sleepy town was a twinkling haze between the rustling bog grasses as the night mists rose over the water and filled the valley. Distant thunder heralded the heavy weather to come.

"You say you know my destiny? Tell me of it then!"

Kain crouched at the sound of the whispered question, hissing softly in recognition. The fledgling was not twenty meters away, crouched over the deep water on an outcrop of rock. A weird blue light bathed Kain's young features, shimmering as the lake's surface did, coming from beneath the water. The infant vampire was conversing with an inaudible companion beneath the surface.

The Reaver on his shoulder came to the same conclusion only a moment before he himself. Blind as it was, it could pick up on the emanations of the astral realm as easily as the wraith within ever had. The blade shuddered and awoke with a blaze of furious white light.

_It is HERE, Kain!_

"I am aware, child." Kain hissed. His alter ego looked up in alarm at the sudden flash. Kain felt a bubble of resigned humor rise in his chest at the confounded expression on the fledgling's face. "And thanks to your enthusiasm, so are they…"

"Kain-the-usurper." A voice, dark as ages, echoed up from the depths of the lake even as the other vampire noticed him. The ancient 'god's laughter was the rumbling of the earth. "It is too late."

"YOU! Again?! What will it take for you to leave me be, demon!" Pale and perfect, the vampire stood abruptly, drawing his sword. "I want nothing to do with you, foulness! I refuse to believe we are at all connected! Return to the hell that spawned you, or I will be obliged to send you there!"

"Peace, vampire." Kain bared his teeth. "You've caused me enough trouble already. Don't compound it by being a willing gull to your enemies. Come with me now and all will be explained."

The ground trembled again, the lake roiling with movements in the deep. "I have already told your pawn all, deceitful one." The elder god chuckled paternally. "Your tricks will no longer work! Go then, into the darkness, never to return! Your time is done."

"I have already been given explanations by another, fiend!" The pale vampire agreed as he raised his flaming sword into an attack stance. "He has told me all about you, false prophet. And the ruination you will engender. I will not allow it! It is for me to restore Nosgoth. He has shown me the way of it! For the Pillars to be restored, you must die! For it is I who is destined to be Balance!"

The boy didn't wait for Kain's reply, diving at him with a childish hiss of fury. Kain drew forth the Reaver without even thinking, blocking the first hit and then the second without hesitation. He was stymied somewhat about how to settle the fight however.

Closing with his sword would accomplish little save having Raziel kill his younger self. The Soul Reaver could hardly limit its nature after all. He resorted to kicking the fledgling in the knee to knock him off balance, and followed with a fist to the thick skull, battering the vampire to the ground.

Kain grabbed the former nobleman by the collar and lifted him to his feet. "Now. Youwill listen." He couldn't help but shake the young fool slightly, truant that he was.

"It may well be true that I must die to save the Pillars. But it will be I who chooses when, and how, I will make that sacrifice. Not you! And certainly not that thing!"

Kain shook his younger-self again when it looked like the obstinate vampire would protest. The fledgling nearly bit his tongue as his complaint was forcibly silenced. Kain had no particular pity for him, glaring, he continued. "And when I shuffle off this mortal coil, Kain, it will fall to you to protect this world with your life's blood. Do you understand? It shall be your fault, and no one else's, should you fail!"

Looking at his own youthful features, contorted by pride and arrogance, Kain wondered if there was any hope of getting through to the vampire. Time had blurred his memories of his own folly, it seemed. Likely Kain would have to discover his obligation for himself, as he himself had once done, so long ago. No amount of shouting would convince the selfish creature that he was wrong. Biting down on his ire, he fought for a more conciliatory tone. "You have no comprehension of just how prolonged your ordeal will be, boy. It will take all your strength, and your wits simply to survive, never mind win. Do not be so eager then, Kain, to trust the unseen. How then will you know, whether the hand extended to you is friendly or treacherous?"

"Better an unseen oracle of the ancients, than a monster like you." Young Kain hissed weakly, struggling to free himself. "I know better than to believe your lies, beast. You may have bested me in the cave, but I was unprepared! This time I am not alone!"

Kain blinked at the pronouncement even as the Reaver shrieked in warning. The blade's hail was too little too late. He could hear the false-god's triumphant shout as well as anyone.

Distracted as he had been by his young stupidity, he had forgotten that the lake itself was a threat. Booming laughter and the sound of splashing water heralded the attack. A shadow fell across him as something blocked the moon. Looking up, he snarled at the sight of the long rubbery appendage that loomed over the water. As thick as a tree trunk, glistening wetly in the sparse moonlight, one of the elder-god's many uncanny limbs coiled in the air. An eruption of spray to his left signaled more tentacles stretching upwards towards the cloudy heavens, undulating as they dripped water and mud.

The first attack was easy to dodge. Kain rolled backwards to avoid the massive wet slap of the cephalopod's arm as the false god sought to flatten him into the mud. The maneuver made him let go of his quarry however. The younger vampire crowed victory as he broke free and backed away, his shouts lost amidst the Elder God's rumbling laughter. Kain barely had time to curse as he dodged two more attacks. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched as one of the huge tentacles gently coiled around the fledgling, and picked young Kain up bodily, hoisting him into the air. Just as quickly, the tentacle retreated out of reach and into the lake, limb and vampire both gone with a ripple beneath the surface.

"Kain!" He cried out in dismay, knowing full well how lethal the mundane liquid could be to a young vampire. Still, the youth had been dragged beneath the surface of the lake with out a shriek. If the boy had just gone to his death, he hadn't seemed alarmed by the prospect. Kain could no more explain it than he could follow after. Even if he had wanted to stop the abduction, the attacks from the unholy creature weren't leaving him much opportunity. Spinning, he hacked one of the tentacles short with an upwards slice, Soul Reaver singing as it cleaved the strange flesh. The other limbs retreated, weaving in the air around his outcrop as if testing his resolve to continue the fight.

"Where have you taken him, slime-eater?" Kain called towards the lake. "Have you nothing further to say? Where is your boasting now!"

"All in good time, Kain." The sinister voice from the lake seemed positively jovial. "That's all you have now, isn't it? Time? The impotent Scion, and his faithful sword. You are nothing. Even if you were to defeat me, what would it gain you? You will be erased, your deeds forgotten, and the world you so claim to love, will wither and fade under the stewardship of yet another Kain, destined to repeat your every mistake. Resign yourself, vampire. He made his choice, just as you did. And it was the wrong one."

"That's a matter of opinion." He snarled and raised his sword again.

A second tentacle was split under his attack, but a third and fourth successively smashed him to the earth and swept him into the air. Turning as he fell, Kain unleashed a force projectile against yet another of his multiplying foes only to feel a final appendage wrap tightly around his waist. Hoisted into the air with enough force to snap a mortal's spine, he grabbed and struck at the surface of the thick tentacle, trying to cut or tear his way free as he was shaken and flipped through the air. Milky ichor splashed everywhere, burning in his eyes, but still the limb refused to let him go. Kain snarled and wrestled with the implausible hold, trying to work the Reaver's long blade in to the flesh despite the inconvenient angle. The false god did not make it easier on him, the limb coiled around his chest squeezing the air out of him as it constricted. Then came the sensation of being pulled again, and also, of free falling. Twisting in the creature's grip Kain grimaced, raising his free arm to cover his face in an instinctive gesture as he was slammed roughly into the surface of the lake.

"Burn, vampire." The Elder God suggested darkly.

Whitewater frothed around Kain as he resumed his struggles, but the tentacle held firm, dragging him deeper into the murky depths. At least the Soul Reaver was again working its magic, the water crackled and stung against his skin and in his eyes, but it could not dissolve him. He spared a fragment of feeling for the ancient fiend he battled against. Kain hoped the creature felt the disappointment keenly, that he was not so easily dispatched by an elemental weakness. There was little else to be entertained with in the situation.

The heavy weight of the water pressed in all around him, unavoidably hampering his every attempt to coordinate an attack. The fluid sucked the heat from his limbs with alarming speed, chilling his muscles even as the lack of air and free movement made his attacks weaker. It had been centuries since he had felt so incapable, but there was no time for self-doubt. He concentrated on tearing apart first one and then another tentacle that sought to bind him until he could finally bring his sword to bear. Twisting and kicking for better leverage, he sank his claws knuckle deep into the last annoyance, carving through it by the fistful until the segmented bone core was severed, crippling the rest. Kain kicked free of the maimed coil, spreading the cloud of watery blood left in the wake of the tentacle's retreat.

Kain's lungs burned with the need to breathe, but he wasn't desperate enough to see yet if the Reaver's power extended far enough to grant him gills. The feel of water on his weathered hide was painful enough. He had no interest in testing himself against its scorch should he try breathing it. Kain tilted his head, trying to spy the surface, amazed to find himself at all buoyant. With muddy water all around him, it took a moment to get oriented and moving in an upward direction. Somehow pushing at the water with feet and hands gave him a crude sort of momentum. Kain doubted he would win any prizes, but his uncoordinated efforts seemed to be moving him in the right direction. He couldn't remember the last time he had been submerged in water, certainly not for the better part of two thousand years. There were faint recollections of splashing in the river as a boy, but even then, there were few opportunities for it in Coorhagen. Somehow his limbs remembered what was necessary.

The Soul Reaver dragged at his progress as he clawed through the water one handed, but he wouldn't have let it go for the world. Its protection was the only thing preventing the lake from flaying him alive. The Reaver's fire was magnified by the silt-laden water. It radiated light like a falling star. Shafts of pure white energy beamed down through the shadowy currents to illuminate the writhing mass of tentacles beneath. Seeing one of the coiling ropes of flesh twisting towards him again, Kain renewed his attempts to swim for the shallows with urgency, his lungs complaining stridently with every stroke.

He broke the surface only long enough to draw a much needed breath of air before something caught a hold of him again. Sucker-covered ropes of muscle twisted around his legs, anchoring him unavoidably to the lake bed. Yanked backwards with a curse, he twisted in the water to deflect the attack, but getting the sword to bite against the slippery skin when hampered by the current was another problem entirely. In the end he had to sink the claws of his free hand into the false-god's limb and saw at it with the side of the Reaver to get loose. Clubbing at yet annoying tentacle, Kain broke surface again. Casting his head back to shift his hair from his eyes, he struggled to find some means out of his predicament. There was nothing but open water around him on all sides.

Kain felt truly out of his element as he attempted to close the distance to a likely spit of land. Strong and fast though his body might be on land, he was not an agile swimmer. If Rahab were here, he thought bitterly. It would have been another matter entirely. But Rahab, was either dead, or not born yet, depending on which way one looked at things. Either way the once and future vampire lord-of-waters wasn't here now.

"Kain!"

He looked up as a dark shadow crossed between him and the moon. Kain smiled despite himself. His knight errant had found him at last. Raziel wheeled in the air, feathers and hair rippling against a strong crosswind that had come down through the valley. Storm clouds were mounting fast in the night sky, bringing with them rumbles of distant thunder. "Kain, take my hand!"

The foolhardy vampire ducked and weaved as the Elder God once again made to dominate the surface of the lake, unwilling to let go of his advantage. Not above using the tentacles to his own advantage, Kain sheathed the Reaver with a splash and used his free hand to grab a fistful of the false-god as another limb erupted next to him. Carried out of the water by the monster's momentum, he jumped free of the tentacle before it could either ensnare or crush him and reached out for his lieutenant. Luck was with him for once, he caught hold of his lieutenant's wrist just as the man captured his own. The wrench to his shoulder was considerable, and for a moment he wasn't certain if his sudden weight would cause them both to crash into the water below. Raziel's flight wobbled erratically as the vampire cursed and beat the air with his wings, fighting for lift.

Somehow Raziel's zeal to be aloft, or the sheer size of his wings, prevailed against the force of gravity. Kain looked down in breathless awe to see the ground receding below with each clap of the vampire's wings against the air. They cleared the edge of the lake and the last of the ancient beast's outstretched tentacles, all as he dangled like a caught fish from Raziel's iron grip.

"Give me your other hand!" The flier shouted at him over the sudden din of the approaching storm. "I need to distribute your weight before my back gives out."

Reaching up, Kain fumbled and caught the vampire's other hand, his own shoulders aching in relief as well by the equalized force. "Drop me?" He advised. "I can transform on the way down."

"Wet bats don't fly!" Raziel replied with a grin, his face brilliantly lit for a moment by a fork of lightening. "We need to find shelter! You may be immune to water, but I'm not!"

"North?!" Kain tried to get his bearings. "Just over the mountains Steinchencröe is in the midst of a plague scare. Neighboring Coorhagen is already burning bodies in the streets. There are bound to be houses left empty as the fools flee to the south."

"Lovely!" His lieutenant critiqued as he spread his wings to catch and bite into the storm front. Feathers fanned wide trying to ride the gale. Tipping his face to allow his voice to carry, Raziel's hair blew across his eyes, giving him a wild look. "It's good we have a following wind! You're heavier than my usual passengers, wet or not."

"You've done this before?" Kain called up to the man carrying him over the ragged hills. Trees were bending and groaning beneath his feet with the power of the wind that they were riding.

"Once or twice." Raziel laughed, as exhilarated by the fast-moving air currents as Kain was by the altitude. They rode an eddy higher, the vampire's grey wings beating to catch the new current before locking wide again, soaring with enviable ease. "My brothers received their wings after I did, and there was a time or two it was easier for me to carry them across some obstacle then for conventional solutions to be made. Kain considered such tasks beneath him, so it usually fell to me."

"Remarkable." Holding a decent conversation, while traveling with the speed of an arrow over the hilly countryside, was temporarily beyond Kain's reach. He found himself equally fascinated by the view sweeping between his toes as he was by the sight of Raziel's aerial antics.

Already the stone walls of the prosperous town were visible through the trees. Steinchencröe had never looked so welcoming as it did now. Light from hundreds of glass-encased lanterns softly illuminated the city streets and buildings, a modest beacon in an otherwise storm-darkened valley. The first scattering of raindrops sparkled against his bare arms. Above him the dark haired vampire hissed as his skin scorched. Angling his flight, Raziel banked tightly around the center of the city, "Which building shall we try?"

Kain searched the options, recognizing the brothel's unique roofline, and the old church. Neither held any particular appeal. "Left of the church. Second house, with the roof-balcony." He decided. "It looks as though the ground floors are boarded up. We'll give it a try."

"As you say, lord." Raziel banked again, pivoting sharply in the thick air, shedding speed as he brought them back over the western side of town. Realizing they'd just as likely crash as land, Kain brought his feet up and rammed into the artistic doorway at the back of the balcony. He felt his lieutenant release him just as the wood and glass splintered, the other vampire needing to halt his own progress through the building before his wings were shredded. Kain rolled to a stop in the center of the empty room, regaining his footing against the tattered carpet. Looking back he saw Raziel catch himself against the roof above the doorframe with a crunch of wood and ceramic. The handsome vampire pushed free of the tile and dropped to the balcony in a shower of splinters and broken roof tiles, wincing at the impact. Folding his wings in tight Raziel squirmed through the remains of the doorway as the torrent broke loose.

A wall of droplets obscured everything beyond the edge of the room in seconds. The sound of it filled the room with roar of water smacking the tile roof. Kain staggered past his stunned companion to shoulder what was left of the door closed before the water could drench the floorboards.

Raziel sank to his knees on the carpet, breathing heavily. Steam rose from his feathers and skin where the wet had touched him. Vampiric curse warred with the acidic properties of water as the slight scalds healed over. Kain crouched next to him, mindful of the fact he was still soaked through from the lake, but still concerned over Raziel's wellbeing. A trifle boring the boy might be, but he had just performed a feat worthy of his predecessor. Close inspection showed no particular harm had come of their adventure. Dazed and windswept, his lieutenant was oblivious to his presence. "Raziel?" He traced a claw tip through the unruly mop of black hair, brushing the locks off the vampire's face.

Yellow eyes blinked, and slowly focused on him. "Kain?"

"Yes." He agreed. "You are unhurt?"

Raziel nodded slowly, looking down at the crumbs of timber still clenched spasmodically in his claws and the rest of his bedraggled appearance. When he looked up, his face split into a broad smile. "Not that you could tell from the look of me. You? The lake did you no damage?"

"Shockingly, no." Kain stood before the temptation to ruffle the vampire's hair overruled good sense. "I'm damp, but unharmed."

"What- What was that thing?" His lieutenant pushed himself off the floor, staggering as he found his feet. "I've never seen anything like it. Yet it gave me chills just to fly near it."

"The Elder God." Kain rubbed a palm across his face, feeling exhausted right to the marrow. Surviving a near-drowning hadn't been on his agenda for the evening. "The ultimate false prophet."

Raziel made to touch his shoulder, his face reflecting genuine concern. The vampire's fingers hesitating at the last moment at the moisture beading on his clan shroud and dripping off his hair. Kain gently swept the hand away before the vampire could be harmed. "I am fine, child. I am made of sterner stuff than my enemies anticipate."

"You are invincible." His lieutenant couldn't entirely keep the awe out of his voice. "I have never seen a vampire that could swim."

"You shall." Kain chuckled weakly. "Look to your brothers in future, and you certainly shall."

"Sire?" Raziel could only stare in confusion.

He waved off the vampire's unspoken question with a tired gesture. "Later, Raziel. Later. I feel the urge to build a fire of considerable size, and then steam in front of it for a few hours. But first we'd better make sure this townhouse is as empty as anticipated." Kain put pride enough aside to allow himself to slide a hand along the wall as he descended the narrow stairs to the main portion of the house, too tired to trust his footing should one steps prove false. "You can wait here if you like. Your wings will no doubt be awkward in such close quarters."

"I shall come as well, if it's all the same." Raziel cast a wary eye up at the roof above them. A few small drips were beginning to make themselves known as the water found the weaknesses in the joinery above them and wormed its way downwards. The rain continued to deluge the city outside, the noise only superseded by the occasional clap of thunder. "If I get stuck on the stairs, I'll just have to beg your indulgence and ask for help."

--

The old stone house ended up being inhabited by nothing more interesting than a few stray cats, when all searching was done. Its original owners were long gone, evidence of plague markers painted on the doors and windows made the cause plain. The teams of drudges responsible for cleaning up after such victims had stripped the house pretty much bare. Most of the furnishing had either been burnt or sold to some foolhardy soul who was willing to risk contagion in order to score a bargain. Only a handful of pieces remained; a shelf, a sideboard, a table, a few half broken chairs, a rather moth-eaten cot. He unconsciously took inventory of the humble items as he passed the musty rooms on the second floor and made his way down the more ornate staircase to the first level. A cramped little sitting room was the most likely candidate for their daytime retreat, protected by the house on three sides and exposed only to the alley adjacent to the church on its outer wall. The shutters were boarded over, providing double the protection against wet and any weak light that might eventually pierce the storm. Leaving Raziel to tidy up a little, he prowled the rest of the ground level for any likely supplies.

Kain kicked the broken remains of a bench in the hall into arm-length pieces and stacked them by the door for Raziel to find before prowling the dank rooms of the second floor for such dried rubbish as could make good kindling. He returned with a double handful of old rags and found the fodder was unnecessary. Raziel, having cleared the worst of the junk into the corner of the room, had found a low stool somewhere in the heap and was perched in front of the already blazing pile of lumber.

"A handy trick." Kain critiqued, tossing his now irrelevant addition onto the pile. The rags burned up almost instantly where they landed. "But I suppose you've always had a knack for fire. A mark of distinction for you. I've never known another vampire with the gift, outside of myself and Vorador."

The knight smiled briefly, gesturing to a battered looking chair, apparently also salvaged from the wreckage of the room. "I suppose it must be so in my future as well, for I know of no other vampire, save my lord, who can manipulate the element as I can. It was a shock to everyone when I first discovered my power."

"It was surprising you should inherit such a gift from Kain?" He tested, curious.

"Apparently it was." Raziel shrugged, uncomfortable with being singled out. "Although my brothers share other elemental affinities with him, my lord was ill pleased when mine ended up being fire." He looked up with a hopeful expression. "Was my Kain wrong? Is my gift a natural variation?"

"Natural? Well I wouldn't call it unnatural. Unusual, perhaps. But not unnatural." Kain picked the chair up and placed it in front of the cheerful blaze, settling his weight gingerly down on it. The old furnishing creaked ominously, but grudgingly held under his mass. He dared relax a fraction and stretch his legs out towards the warmth. "I have always had some modest skill at summoning flames. And I know I am not the only vampire in history with such a gift. Compared to other magics I've studied it is not one of my strongest talents, but I wasn't surprised when you came along. Your ability in that particular area are probably better than mine, all things considered. But in that too you are not alone. I long ago realized that I was something of a generalist… I have neither the patience not the natural aptitude to entirely master most subjects I study."

"Kain did not like it. I often wished- well – no matter." The vampire censored himself with a frown, shaking his head instead. Kain raised an eyebrow at the unspoken criticism of his alternate future, wondering what his lieutenant had been about to say. Doubtless it would have been interesting. The more he gleaned of this so-called paradise, the less satisfied he was with it. Nosgoth was by all reports whole and pure, so why did it seem that the corruption remained? To what purpose would the Kain of the future work towards that would result in alienating his finest soldier? It was a mystery. For his part, Raziel seemed content to remain silent on the topic.

The handsome vampire rested his elbows on his knees, leaning sharply forward to stretch his wings. Not having made a study of birds, Kain couldn't describe the mechanics of what he was seeing, but watching the slide of the massive feathers out towards the tips against the shorter, thickly set mass of supporting structures was a marvelous feat. More massive than the largest swan that ever lived, Raziel's wings were eye catching despite his best effort to appear disinterested. His companion stretched one at a time, opening the first with caution so as to not knock against anything, he let it unfurl as far back as it could extend almost touching the back wall, feathers spreading wide, like fingers, as the vampire sighed in relief. Folding the mass back inwards until it was tidy against his spine, the vampire repeated the maneuver with the other wing.

Kain wondered what it must feel like to have feathers growing out from the skin. Knowing he was being obvious in his staring, he resumed watching the fire instead. Still he could not shake the feeling of morbid curiosity. Attempting to bait his companion into further explanation, he allowed himself a mild critique. "From the sound of it, your Kain wasn't pleased with much."

"Not true." The dark haired vampire shook his head, oblivious to any subterfuge. "He has been a just and able ruler, and takes pleasure in many things. It is I who is usually in the wrong. I often speak when I ought to be silent. I am impulsive when I ought to be reserved. I wield dangerous magic that he cannot contain. Make no mistake, Kain. I am a very troublesome child."

"But usually a very pleasing one, just the same." Kain murmured, more to his sword, than to his fellow vampire. "Your fiery nature is, was, part of your charm."

"Perhaps in that sense, you and he are different men." Raziel scratched lightly at the healing skin of his arm, the rain having marked him in their final moments of flight. "My Kain doesn't find my 'fire' so entertaining as you seem to. He prefers order, and predictability."

"How dull." Kain snorted, disappointed in his parallel future self. Passivity was not the exclusive realm of his new child it seemed. The whole world had grown boring in its wholesomeness. Stretching his toes a little closer to the fire, he let the warmth settle into his bones. Another hour or so and the worst of the wet would be baked away. He wondered if he was lazy enough to dare to nap so close to open flame. Surely the Reaver would keep him from igniting like so much kindling if the blaze collapsed over his feet? If it could stop water from scalding him to death, then fire ought to be a trivial matter.

Not feeling entirely confident, he shifted his legs slightly, gaining precious inches between himself and the embers while not sacrificing the warm glow. There would be no running around for a little while, not with the storm just beyond the house's sturdy walls. He might abandon Raziel here and forge on alone, but where would he look? Throwing himself into the bottom of ever lake and river this side of the continental divide seemed a ridiculous way to pass the time, and even if he did, it was doubtful he'd find anything. The old monster would have to cough-up Kain sooner or later. And when the youth next returned to solid ground, he would begin the hunt again.

With little else to do but sit in the abandoned building and make small talk with his replacement-child, Kain found the urge to sleep was strong. Settling himself further into his chair, he let his eyes drift closed, feeling better simply for the pretense of napping.

"Kain?"

Of course the boy wouldn't be able to take a hint. He sighed silently and leaned his head back, letting the Reaver and its harness take the weight of his skull. The sword wasn't the most comfortable pillow he had ever had, but oddly it wasn't the worst either. It hummed in a soothing way, attune to his exhaustion. All previous hostility appeared to be forgotten. Had the sword been the vampire it once was, he would have teased him about his fickleness. Resigned to silence from his long-suffering blade, he accepted the offered sympathy at face value.

"Keep watch if you want. Or do as you like." Kain drawled as he let himself relax despite the fire at his feet and the downpour outside. His sword would alert him to anything truly unpleasant. "I doubt anything will be bothering us until the rain lets up, so I will take the opportunity provided and rest."

"How can you sleep with that storm…" Raziel's commentary was drowned out by a prolonged crackle of thunder.

"Quite easily." He muttered.

The cracking shifting sounds of timbers and stones under stress could heard even in dreams. The sounds, so out of place in his half-formed memories of the Empire, goaded him slowly towards wakefulness. Kain awoke to a shuddering wooden groan from above. The trestles holding up the attic warped and tore free of each other, twisting and splintering the roof even as it collapsed into the upper floor. On his feet before he had fully understood what he was hearing, Kain stared upwards, amazed at the silt shifting down through the ceiling of their bolt-hole. The steady sound of rain had been replaced with a clattering racket, projectiles pinging of the top of the stairs in the hall to skitter and pile down onto the landing above, gleaming wetly in the firelight.

"What the…" Kain turned, recognizing the sound coming from outside the shuttered windows, more of the almost-metallic pinging of a hundred thousand ingots across a stone slab. Frozen rain? In the middle of summer?

"Hail." Raziel emerged from the kitchen, looking flustered. Not bothering to wait for his reply, the vampire crossed the room and peered into the front hallway. Kain followed, looking grimly up at the debris filling the stairwell. The garret in the attic had completely given way under the weight of the storm. Roof tiles and timbers scattered and stacked almost-flat in what used to be bedrooms above stairs. A landslide of plaster and broken lath filled the staircase from top to bottom, more breaking off from the walls and ceiling as the collapse settled further.

"Stones the size of Centennial coins? What madness is this?" Raziel gingerly picked up one of the offending objects with his claw tips, holding it out for inspection.

"Hmph." Kain rubbed his face and accepted the offering. The ice steamed in the relative warmth of the room. At least the last of the wet had been baked from his bones before this latest catastrophe. Kain felt better for the nap and wondered how long he had been asleep. Long enough for a solid foot of ice to coat the city, it appeared. The roof, or what was left of it, groaned again, the whole building shivering due to the redistribution of weight. It didn't bode well for the ceiling overhead. Kain hissed, wondering if the rest of the town was suffering from similar deprivations. The storm was completely unnatural for the season and region. He doubted a tree would be left standing for miles, if his house was any indication of its ferocity. It didn't make their situation any more pleasant to contemplate the suffering of others, however.

He returned to the cozy warmth of their salon and grimly tossed the hailstone into the embers. It was time to relocate to a safer retreat. He kicked a corner of the worn carped up over the fire's embers and smothered them with his foot. The heat had done its work. His hair and leathers were dry to the touch. Raziel simply watched as he finger-combed his mane crudely back into its usual tail and then tucked his chair under his arm. "We need to go lower, unless you feel up to flying in an ice-storm. Is there a basement to this rat trap?"

"A wine cellar, from the look of things." Raziel nodded. "I was just clearing the path now…"

"You should have woken me." Kain frowned, realizing the vampire must have left him idly napping while the house collapsed around them both. "You're hardly built for scrounging around in tight spaces, and I would have appreciated some warning as to the roof."

The vampire's wings fluffed with his annoyance at the rebuke. "You needed the rest. And I required no assistance. I would have awakened you in good time to relocate… but that there was an earthquake…"

"Would that have been before or after the rest of the building collapsed." He scolded and then caught himself. "What earthquake?"

"The earthquake we had just now… you didn't feel it?" Raziel frowned.

"This area doesn't get earthquakes, not for years yet. I would hardly have slept through it, regardless." Kain shook his head. "You must have imagined it. It was the roof failing, nothing more." Ignoring his lieutenant's hurt expression he pushed past the templar and into the abandoned kitchen.

The shelves and counters had been picked clean months ago by scavengers. Not a pot or pitcher remained. An assortment of broken crockery was piled in the corner, but otherwise the room was fairly barren. Kain felt the chilly breeze from the drafty shutters even as he followed Raziel's dusty footprints through a pantry and to a service stairway leading down. "Come on." He turned to the dark haired vampire. "We can debate your earthquake later, for now I think we will engage in a tactical retreat."

More of a vault than a simple cellar, the storeroom suited their needs more than adequately. Kain ran an appreciative hand along the sturdy brick arches separating the space and felt more comfortable immediately. The whole building could flatten itself to next to nothing and they would be snug and dry down below. It would be annoying to dig out, when the storm finally cleared, but not so annoying that he wanted to go wander out in the hailstorm instead. Planting his chair against one of the empty wineracks, Kain allowed himself a slow stretch, feeling far better than he had in recent memory. Raziel was mussing around on the far side of the room, exploring the contents of an old trunk half-hidden by the shadows. "Anything good?"

"A lantern." The vampire replied, too preoccupied with priming the dusty implement to remember his annoyance. "Some candles and a few blankets. Someone expected to be down here before us."

"Probably a precaution against invasion." Kain sighed, settling in his chair again. The sound of hail was muffled now that they were below the street, but his sharp ears could pick out the general clatter above. "It wasn't so long ago this whole area was Seraphan hunting grounds… Someone probably wanted a safe place to sleep should the local hotheads decide to bivouac in town."

"Very likely." Raziel agreed calmly. "Would y-" Whatever he had been about to ask was forgotten as the world suddenly went erratic. Staggering with his lamp, the dark haired vampire veered into the wall and pressed against it to keep his balance as the ground shook.

Kain hissed at the suddenness of the quake, rising from his chair only to find it impossible to keep his footing. He crouched instead, trying to watch all the brickwork around them at once. Luckily the old arches were well made without excess mortar. The tightly fitted blocks shifted and shed dust but stayed mostly where they were. Fine cracks opened along some of the columns, but the structure seemed solid enough to weather even this unexpected blow.

The tremors abated a moment only to begin again, shaking the townhouse from root to crown. Eventually the abandoned building could take no more abuse. It collapsed in painful-sounding stages above them, beams and shingles splitting and splintering as hail and earth knocked it to pieces. The air of their chamber filled with the scent of dust and ice as the debris filled the stairwell. For a moment Kain glimpsed murky daylight at the top of the pile, but soon even that tiny glimpse of the outside world was blanketed in crumbling wreckage and piled slush. Grabbing Raziel by the arm, he retreated to the far wall of the cellar away from the danger as the shaking abated. Together they watched the pile of broken rubble grow and shift for several silent minutes.

It would take hours to dig out, even with two vampires on the task. With the ice mixed throughout, it promised to be painful work for bare hands. Kain sighed loudly, as the last of the aftershocks finished. Raziel simply bent down to recover fallen crate, setting the lamp atop the makeshift table. It wasn't until the handsome vampire met his gaze, raising an eloquent eyebrow, that Kain retraced their conversation of a moment prior. His new lieutenant had a subtlety that the old one had never bothered with, he was obliged to admit. He ought to have been up to his knees in 'I told you so' by now.

Stepping past the vampire to inspect the magnitude of the chore ahead of them, Kain reached out to clasp Raziel's shoulder, acknowledging him. "It seems your earthquake from earlier brought a friend."

Raziel snorted in soft amusement, accepting the apology without further comment. Turning his attention to the blocked stairs he shrugged at the sight. "Now what?"

"Now nothing." Kain rubbed his neck, feeling stiff. "The storm can't go all-out like this for much longer. We'll keep to our original plan."

"We'll be buried alive down here." Raziel murmured, eying the pile grimly.

"Doubtful." Kain found an empty ale keg and tipped it over to act as a foot stool before sitting down again. "A few hours and we ought to be able to carve a hole through this large enough for even your wings. We'll wait until the hail stops, and then we will dig."


	5. Chapter 5

**Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King **

(A continuation fan-fiction for Legacy of Kain: Defiance)

/../- implies vampiric 'whisper' a.k.a. telepathy/mental projection.

The Soul Reaver isn't capable of speech as such, but I gave it dialog anyway to show that Kain can interpret its wordless snark without difficulty? I have no idea. Just go with it.

-- -- --

huge thanks to wanderingaddict, my long, long, loooong suffering beta who keeps me on task and on tone with this monsterous little story.

also thanks to various people who pointed out I was misspelling 'Moebius', amongst other things. Go fig. I'll have to go back and comb the previous chapters eventually to correct it.

-- -- --

**The End: Chapter 5-**

At least the crumbling rubble made for excellent kindling. Kain let Raziel do the honors, admiring way the templar could easily ignite wood that moments before was coated in ice. The younger vampire was hanging back, allowing his hands to mend from where a particularly wet pile of slush had slipped down and scorched him to the elbow. Kain sent a burst of mental thanks to the blade across his shoulders as he shifted a chunk of wall off the pile and into the corner. The wet continued to remain nothing more than a nuisance thanks to the Reaver's intervention. Packed ice crumbled beneath his claws as he pulled the next piece loose, sending it to join the rest on the floor.

They had made excellent progress. Already the stairs were mostly free. All that was left was to burrow out the side of the broken structure, and see what remained of the world beyond. The wind moaned mournfully beyond the wall of broken masonry and timbers. The storm had blown out after several wild hours. No doubt it was rolling north, punishing the already battered city of Coorhagen. Kain sighed and dug his fingers into the mess again, repeating the tedious process.

"What were you doing lurking about in Moebius' strong hold anyway?" Kain paused to dig the embedded ice out from under his finger claws, hoping grimly that his younger-self was having an equally annoying morning. Raziel looked up, surprised at the question.

"My lord?"

Kain sighed at the hopeless task of breaking the man's habit of formality. He pointed at Raziel's chest with an authoritative claw. "You said that your lord was celebrating, the day I found you. A centennial festival marking his ascension to 'Scion,' did you not?"

"I suppose I did." The vampire hedged, still confused.

"So why were you not at his side?" Kain inquired, turning back to his chore. The rubble would hardly clear itself, and magic at such close quarters was a foolish proposition. Grimly he contemplated what might happen if he buried the Reaver hilt deep in the mess and asked it to kindly clear a path. Likely the well-meaning but heavy handed weapon would bring the roof down on their little catacomb. Then again, if they survived, escaping through the shattered ceiling was as probable as their current course. He snorted at the idea. "What on earth were you doing prowling around in the basement of a stronghold long abandoned all alone?"

"I-" Raziel sounded chagrined. "I was… not invited."

"What?" Kain blinked, unable to fathom the words. He turned to stare at the handsome vampire. The pronouncement was ridiculous. Not invited? Raziel? Even when he had been annoyed at his lieutenant's means and methods in the past, he had never actively excluded the man from his court. To do so would mean not keeping an eye on him, for one thing. "What on earth possessed him to do a thing like that?"

"Or rather, there was a change made at the last." Raziel held up his hands to defend against his incredulous question, protective of his Scion, even now. "Some disturbances had been noted in the area of the lake, small quakes, strange sightings… Someone needed to investigate."

"So why not send a search party? Surely you have better things to do with your time."

"Not really." Raziel shrugged, lightly scratching at his healing arm with his claw tips. "I confess I rather welcomed the distraction. My sire gets- irritable during anniversary festivities. I often misspeak and cause unintentional upset. It is better for all that I am not around to excite his temper further."

"I do not understand your meaning." Kain shook his head, pulling another piece of wooden beam free of the mess and tossing it to the vampire to be added to the fire. "You mean to say Kain prefers it when you are absent?"

"I do not pretend to imagine I am his favorite," Raziel laughed weakly, stacking the new kindling atop the blaze, staring at the small bonfire morosely. "I tend to annoy him. I can't seem to help myself. I will never be like Dumah."

"God help us if you become like Dumah." Kain replied sharply, tearing at the debris with renewed spirit. Even the thought of Raziel adopting the lazy self-serving habits of his other lieutenant made him itch to dig his claws into something. "I'd kill the pair of you with my bare hands before I let that happen."

Raziel shot him an odd look, choosing to let the comment by unremarked upon. "In any case… The festival itself isn't all that exciting. Mostly it is just the procession, and the renewing of oaths. All of the vampire lords are required to bring tithe to the capital as a show of loyalty to the Empire once every hundred years. But it is usually a nervous affair. During the anniversary Kain is obliged to don the Soul Reaver. He is more quarrelsome than usual when he is compelled to take the blade from its crypt."

"Seeing you wear it so easily, I confess I am amazed." Raziel's smile was genuine. "For my Kain, holding the blade seemed a loathsome thing to do. I always imagined it that simply picking it up put one's soul in jeopardy and only the Scion could withstand its evil power. That was why none but he were to approach its resting place or attempt to touch it. It would eat any life-force within a hundred paces if not for his will."

Kain gave up on any attempt to resume digging, stunned by the news beyond any ability to conceal. He turned and stared again, trying to read a deeper meaning in the boy's words. Raziel simply blinked at him, startled by his sudden attention.

"Your Kain… doesn't wear the Reaver? He sets it aside?" He couldn't keep the absolute shock from his voice.

"Yes." Raziel nodded. "In a special vault made to that purpose. Its coffin is lined with lead, gold, and steel. The outer casing was enchanted several times over by the empire's finest mages. They created a special crypt for it where by it can be sunken on chains into a deep well at the heart of the castle to keep it safely hidden from any foolish enough to come near. Truly, it is a marvelous contraption. If not for the expectations of the people; the tradition of the Scion and his famed Sword of Blight standing in the main hall to accept the oaths of the clans once a century… the demon blade would never be taken out, it is so terrible to behold."

Kain swallowed bile, stunned. He had put the Reaver aside for a matter of moments, and had felt at least a shadow of what the sword had experienced. To deliberately abandon it? Madness. Raw, undiluted madness. What on earth could Kain have been thinking? It didn't require any particular brilliance of intellect to see exactly what that sort of treatment would do to the soul contained within the blade. A millennium of horror and isolation? Only to be taken out once a century and waived about as a toy? A totem?

Did Kain even think to feed the damn thing?

Probably not.

Kain grimaced at the revelation. This was his future. This was the wholesome world he had engendered through his efforts of the last thousand years. An eternity of suffering and despair for the one creature in the whole of history who dared to call himself 'Kain's Right Hand', the author of his salvation? No good deed ever went unpunished, it seemed.

The terrible irony of it all almost made him laugh. What a sick joke! The world was wholesome and pure? How could Nosgoth count itself 'restored' when such a cruel and ungrateful creature as that claimed to be Scion of Balance? Better that the whole mess dissolve into oblivion, and let the false-god chew on the remaining crumbs.

"Are you ill, lord?"

"Yes." Kain said simply. "I do believe I am."

His surprise and upset were so absolute that the Reaver stirred against his spine, curious to know what it was that had alarmed him so. It took a long moment to get his thoughts in order before he dared to open himself up to the blade's probing. Kain mentally soothed the weapon's concerns, unwilling to share such disgusting piece of trivia with his faithful lieutenant. It took a few minutes to convince the blade that there was no threat of immanent attack. But eventually it settled to its usual level of indifferent acceptance. Opening his eyes he noted that the templar had drawn back a little, shying from the sword's baleful light.

He rubbed his face remembering his alter-ego's look of revulsion when presented with the sword back at the blood shrine. Was it so far-fetched to believe the vampire capable of such cruelty? No, the sick thing was, he could see it very easily. All it would require was for the Reaver to balk against Kain's selfish intentions one time too often, especially at the beginning. Should the blade have ever become more of a burden than an asset, he would have discarded or destroyed it years before he learned its true purpose. By the time he did determine its nature, it would be far too late to undo the damage.

But why would the Reaver want to antagonize its master to such a degree? It had challenged him occasionally, but never beyond his ability to dominate. If anything, he had long had the impression that it liked him, in its perverse and parasitic way. At least it had recognized him as its lord, at any rate. After learning the source of the soul that gave his sword power, Kain hadn't been terribly surprised. This new Kain's sword sounded like an altogether more puissant blade, one willful enough to frighten the vampire who dared to call himself its master.

A blade not entirely dissimilar to his own now?

Kain drew the sword, instinctively needing to confirm that it was still his. As soon as his fingers wrapped around the hilt, Raziel's fire coiled up and over his wrist, returning his grip with one just as assured. It would take more than a mere accident to separate the pair of them, he was certain. The only way the sword would ever leave his side was if they were both incapacitated somehow, or, more likely, he stupidly gave it away. The thought made him pause. His brain, refreshed by its recent rest, was more than happy to elaborate on the half considered idea.

What if his fledgling-self had accepted the sword? What if this disgusting future was the result, not of yet another plot by Moebius and his monstrous oracle, but the natural consequence of his own meddling? Trying to predict the branching of the time-stream was a maddening activity. There were simply too many variables. Kain shook his head in denial. The youngster running around out in the wilds was an idiot, but he was still 'Kain'. He would not throw away a weapon destined for his hand. He would hesitate at first. That was to be expected. But as soon as he saw what a powerful tool it was, surely, he would come to respect the sword as the remarkable creature it was?

Kain hated that even in the silence of his thoughts he couldn't entirely dismiss his doubts. "What a horrible thing for him to have done." He spoke at last. "And very ill advised."

"Was it?" Raziel looked at him, confused by his reaction.

"What is it that makes your blade so harmless, while his was painful to even look upon? I have noted that your blade inspires no ill feelings to those around it. It puzzles me exceedingly." The knight shook his head at the mystery. "I could barely stand in the same room as it before now. Usually anxiety would take me before half an hour had passed and I would not be able to calm myself until I left its presence."

Raziel smiled self-effacingly as he rested his elbows on his knees, studying the fire. "No wonder my lord thinks I am weak. None of my brethren are affected so strongly."

"Nor should they." Kain grimly replied, grimacing at the unexpected prophesy he had been given. "They have only conventional fears. They do know the meaning of true horror."

It was wrong. It was all wrong; Raziel's timidity, the Reaver's fate, Nosgoth's false fruitfulness. It was simply another road to defeat. It had to be. He did not doubt that without the Soul Reaver's full cooperation, there'd be no way of defeating the beast lurking beneath the waters. The Scion's powers would be hopelessly compromised. No doubt the false god was laughing itself sick, while it orchestrated the fall of the world in some new fashion.

"I was a fool. I thought your future was an ideal." He ought to have been used to disappointment by now. Kain almost smiled at his own reaction to the unexpected news. Hope was a dangerous commodity, even in small amounts. There had been such potential in the future Raziel had come from, but it was not good enough. Better to fail utterly and know it, than to miss his mark by such a slight – yet critical – margin and pretend all was well. It wouldn't do. He'd not come this far to settle for such a crippled version of the future. "Now I see it is just another false-start, a dead end. It cannot be the outcome I seek."

"You think there is a better one?" Raziel blinked at him, as if considering the possibility for the first time. "A future where the Reaver isn't blighted?"

"There has to be." Kain folded his fingers over the hilt, rubbing at the Reaver's skull with gentle claw-tips. "I refuse to allow future where the Reaver is so maligned. Hearing of such a thing disgusts me beyond all measuring."

"Forgive me." Raziel looked worried, his wings visibly drooping with his concern. "I didn't realize how it would upset you."

Kain looked over sardonically. "Had you known, would you have withheld the truth?" The knight winced.

"Perhaps I would have told it more… circumspectly." Raziel hedged.

"Lying to protect me from those facts I find distasteful… That is how I am served in the future? I begin to see what sort of man I am." Kain snarled. "No wonder you turned out so-" He forced himself to stop before he uttered the insult. It was hardly Raziel's fault he had become spineless over the years. From the sound of it, his master preferred him that way.

The dark haired vampire grimaced just the same as if he had finished the thought, hunched over and studying his hands as they healed. He was supposedly the same age as his own lost-child had been before his death, Kain frowned. The knight seemed much younger than his years and evolution evidenced. His complete lack of self confidence and tendency towards slouching did little dispel the aura of helplessness. This was the creature who had survived an aerial battle with Janos Audron? This was a seasoned warrior of the Empire? It was as if a switch was thrown in the knight's head, meek as a lamb unless provoked.

Snorting at some private thought, the vampire looked up at him, curious. "What would your Raziel have done in my place?"

"My Raziel?" He paused, genuinely surprised by the question. The knight shared his lieutenant's face but was so different otherwise that it was hard to draw a correlation. He smiled as he considered the answer. "Sputter a great deal, for a start."

Kain could easily see his Raziel's reaction to such a Kain. The so-called Scion wouldn't have had a moment's peace. Raziel had been a difficult lieutenant even in good times, headstrong and willful. When he had felt he was wronged? His moods had a habit of infecting half the court within days. A rebellious Raziel usually meant months of unsettled politics amongst the clans.

"If he felt I was doing something stupid, he'd find some way to corner me and make his opinion known without delay. If I still failed to see reason? He'd try again, but louder." The memory of his lieutenant's frequent and stubbornly opinionated outbursts over the years was painful in its clarity. Kain shook his head again, dispelling the unwanted reminiscence.

"I suppose that if he had ever truly decided I wasn't worth the effort of correcting, he would have set himself to overthrowing me. Raziel had little tolerance for cowardice, or laziness, for that matter. If it proved more expedient to kill me than continue an argument, he would have certainly tried. Better, in his mind, to clear the way for the Pillars to appoint a better, or at least saner, Guardian of Balance, than to suffer a fool. I'd have crushed him without hesitation, of course, but such a mundane threat wouldn't have stopped him from trying." Kain smiled at the fire, bitterly nostalgic for his old empire.

"He would confront you directly? Challenge your decisions to your face?" Raziel blinked in amazement.

"Frequently. Our fights were somewhat infamous over the years." Kain couldn't help but feel depressed about what he had lost. Verbally fencing with his stubborn child had been just as entertaining as physically sparring. Their contests had never been dull, whatever form they had taken on. "I always won, of course, but he never failed to challenge me. To test my resolve."

How many years had they danced around each other in their elaborately petty games of politics? It had to have been better part of five hundred years, easily. Time had seemed to move much faster then. The shocked silence that had settled over the court after Raziel's death had been positively stifling by comparison. No wonder he had disbanded the fools shortly after.

His new Raziel digested the information with a disbelieving shake of his head. "I don't think I could do that."

"No." Kain agreed, looking at him regretfully. "No, you are too passionless for such antics."

Raziel pulled back as if rebuked, and looked away, finding the piles of damp rubble suddenly engrossing. Kain let him digest the critique. He could do little else for the vampire, at least he could tell the man where he stood. If this new lieutenant of his had even the barest ember left of pride or self-determination, maybe the chiding would encourage him to make something of himself. It was a shame to see such potential wasted, even in a future as pathetic as the templar's seemed to be. Raziel may have avoided being sacrificed to the false-god, but what did it matter if he lived like one dead for an eternity?

"It is not that my Raziel was right, child." Kain offered, turning back to his work once again. A draft from between two of the larger piles of timber inspired him to direct his efforts in that direction. "Or that your attitude is specifically wrong…"

A forceful tug refused to budge the stubborn trestle. Frustrated, he pressed his hand into the debris and gathered a ball of kinetic energy around his fingers. The ensuing blast was extremely satisfying, especially as it worked wonders to clear a channel to the city beyond. "More, it is a matter of natural inclination verses external pressure. Does dutifully and diligently serving such a Kain as yours give you pleasure? Can you look in the mirror each day and recognize the man gazing back at you? I wonder if you can."

The vampire behind him said nothing, lost in thought. Kain allowed the man his meditations, working at enlarging the opening he had created with both feet and hands. Kicking out a last stubborn slab of stone, he ducked to investigate the result and was pleased to see his cramped passage was complete. It was crude but there was space enough to wedge himself through. Kain pushed his way out onto the ice-coated street. The air was positively clammy beyond the cozy warmth of their dilapidated shelter. Ice sublimated into a thick fog as the weak sunlight did its best to correct the chaos the storm had wrought.

Cool grey light reflected from all sides. The sky above was leaden, but what light there was seemed to come from everywhere at once. The broken walls and buildings were glazed an inch thick with the residue of the storm. The shattered town had a winter-like aspect despite it being late summer. In the distance he could hear the raucous chatter of crows as the hearty birds circled somewhere in the mist overhead. The faint wailing of a child proved that at least one human was left alive in the ghostly remains of the city. He frowned, having no memory of such a disastrous event in his youth. Truly, it had been a long time ago. If he hadn't been directly affected by the storm at the time, there was no reason for him to have remembered it. But still something nagged at his conscience. The storm, and the faint tremors that still racked the ground, weren't part of any history he had ever seen or heard.

Turning to appraise the remains of his particular building, Kain found it pretty much as he expected. The house was just about flat to the ground, weighted down by a heavy layer of icy roof tiles. Even worse, the church adjacent had lost a portion of its roof as well, the additional debris piling on top of his crumpled building and filling the alley between. Kain shook his head at the poor workmanship as he set about widening the entrance to the cellar further. Now that he was able to see the source of the stubborn beams obstructing his tunnel, working to clear a path for the winged vampire still within was considerably easier. Wrapping his arms around a particularly weighty looking timber, he pulled it and the attached portion of roof to the side.

Raziel clattered about on the other side of the problem. Guilt and confusion set aside in favor of seeking freedom from his unwanted sanctuary. Matching his work from the other end of the passage with renewed vigor, the vampire pulled the loose piles of debris from the widening gap, despite the watery risks. Kain let him work unchallenged, not willing to cause further upset to his only ally.

Between the two of them they created a generous path within minutes. Raziel pulled himself out onto the road with an unusually grim expression. Glancing around them a moment, the winged vampire resolutely shook out his grey feathered appendages and launched himself vertically, climbing in the foggy air over the city. Within a few meters, his outline blurred, a dark grey shadow against a leaden grey sky. Kain couldn't blame the creature for wanting to get back into his element after the stuffy night and morning spent indoors. He just hoped the fool wouldn't stray far, trying to find him again when the world was gone mad would be a considerable challenge on foot. The sound of the muffled wing beats faded momentarily as the vampire gained altitude, but soon approached again. Raziel returned to circle the remains of the town square where he stood.

"What do you see?" He called up to the winged vampire.

Raziel swooped low over a roof and then caught an invisible upwards current, settling fastidiously on the broken remains of a wall like a brooding gull. His feathers blended in with the grey of the world around them, the brilliant red of his tattered surcoat a surprising burst of color against the monochrome. "Everywhere is ruination, lord." Raziel kicked some ice away from his perch, sitting on his heels as he raised his head, seeming to scent the wind. "There's not a building left unmarked, many are completely lost under ice. It promises to be an uncomfortable day for survivors."

"Wonderful." Kain sighed, wiping his hands dry on his clan-cape. "First that squid emancipates our young fool, and now the waterways freeze solid in a freak storm. It's probably too much to hope that the beast was prowling in the shallows and caught in the kill-frost."

His companion simply waited for him to finish venting, fluffing his wings for warmth against the chilly fog. There would be no useful advice forthcoming from that corner. Kain sighed, sorely wishing for a moment that he could trade lieutenants, sword for man. Perhaps his Raziel would have some inkling of where to look for his idiotic alter ego.

Closing his eyes, he tried to communicate his lack of inspiration to the Reaver blade resting against his shoulder. A burst of warmth flowed over him as the spirit within became aware of his predicament. Temporarily amused by his silent companion's ability to handle his mundane wants as well as his more bloodthirsty ones, Kain enjoyed the respite from the fog.

/Where would the beast hide our little runaway?/ He let the question rest in his conscious mind, feeling Raziel's faint curiosity. /We caved in the chamber beneath the Citadel, somewhere else? The Lake? /

The sword grasped his need with little prompting. For a moment he felt its preoccupation, and then tasted the sharp tang of bitter certainty. Flickers of images, memories, poured into his waiting mind, wooded valleys, swampy ravines, a portal into the earth, a passage in the darkness leading to a subterranean chamber filled with frescos… Beneath the Pillars? Kain opened his eyes, aghast at what he had seen.

The false god's tentacles had coiled around the shattered stubs of the monument where they pierced the ceiling. Portions of their broken length were left protruding from the floor as they continued their decent, who knew how far down. The possessive way that the green-brown limbs had clung to the fractured Pillars gave him chills, as if somehow it was the beast's handiwork, and not his own arrogance that had been responsible for the cataclysm.

Almost two thousand years he had sat as Emperor at the foot of the Pillars. Two millennia, and all that time, the chatty squid had been no further away than the length of his arm? Lurking beneath his throne like the proverbial rat in the pantry? To think he had been disgusted only a day ago by the idea of it prowling the lake beyond his front door. It had been squatting beneath him the whole time. It was a wonder he hadn't heard it laughing! Why had they never dug down beneath the throne room? He couldn't help but project his outrage to Raziel as he reeled from the shock. How had he never realized that the solid foundation he had thought to build upon was actually nothing more than a veneer over something truly pestilent?

_Even if you had looked. You wouldn't have found it._

The sword shivered, sharing his disgust. Kain winced, knowing Raziel spoke the truth. He had stood not twenty feet from it at the base of the Citadel when he had the satisfaction of killing Moebius for the last time, and he had no idea that he had not been alone. Not until Raziel's sacrifice had lifted the fog from his eyes. How was such a monster to be fought, if he was truly the only one who could see it? He pushed away the despairing thought in favor of ones more productive.

The circular platform Raziel's memories had shown him was a copy of the one above ground, except surrounded on all sides by water. A subterranean river, or lake, or both, flowed around and under the Pillar's second shrine, a column of water sinking deep into the earth, side passages leading both to the lakes of the east-country, and deep into Vorador's swamp. There, of course, would be an ideal place to store a vampire safe and dry, while awaiting the perfect moment to strike.

/Clever, child. I agree completely. / He complimented the Reaver, happier than ever that the blade was with him and not the fledgling.

There might be no easy way down to the hidden vestibule from the Pillars themselves, but the entrance his Raziel had used to the subterranean passage seemed to still be accessible. Kain matched Raziel's memories against his own, and made an educated guess. "We're heading back south, to the Great Swamp. I think it's time that we were reunited with our wayward Kain."

"As you say, lord." Raziel nodded, launching himself into the air and circling expectantly. Kain frowned at the dispassionate acceptance of his orders from the templar, so different from his earlier grousing. Clearly he had struck a nerve with his critique. He hoped the poor fool wouldn't take it overly to heart. The last thing he needed right now was for his only useful ally to have a crisis of faith.

"Follow me to the old-shrine at the southern edge of the forest." He instructed, willing to give the boy his space for the moment. "We'll walk in from there."

Leading the way as a cloud of bats, Kain saw for himself the ruined expanse of countryside. Everything north of Nachtholm was smashed flat. Acres of woodland were little better than kindling. The trees, heavy with their summer canopy, hadn't stood a chance against both wind and hail. The scattered farms and villages looked in equally bad shape. There was little he could do for the poor fools on the ground now. Perhaps if the Pillars were restored, some reparation might be made. Focusing his energy on the flight, he swarmed south past the battered landscape and into the wet wilderness beyond the storm's reach.

-- -- --

The air of Vorador's chosen hermitage was necessarily fetid with the dank smell of fermentation and rot. It required a particularly generous frame of mind for anyone to call the swamp lovely. Kain had never quite developed the necessary level of denial to agree with Vorador's congenial assessment of the place. It was possibly the most miserable, inhospitable bit of scenery in the whole of Nosgoth, Meridian's infamous sewers included. When the landscape itself wasn't trying to kill a man, the sundry wildlife that lurked within it was more than up to the task. Certainly, even the Saraphan had suffered mightily in investigating the place, but then, so did everyone.

Massive trees crowded the valley, made more massive by a thousand creeping vines and mosses. Their towering branches blocked almost all daylight from the marshy floor of the forest. The lowest level was muddy at best, and treacherous sucking bogs at worst. Kain navigated from hillock to boulder to broken pillar by the simple expedient of jumping. Raziel floated ghostlike after him in the half light of the swamp. Wing beats softened by the humid air. Giving his blade a mental nudge, Kain followed its subliminal cues, navigating down one wet path and then another, veering sharply east when the dry high-ground that led to Vorador's keep became visible.

The place was unspeakably dreary. No wonder the old vampire had become so sour over the long years of his self-inflicted exile. Kain paused at a particularly tall bit of masonry, choosing to climb it and get his bearings before following the Reaver's goading deeper into the trees. Despite familiarity with the area, something in the dense vegetation was making his neck itch. He surveyed the shadows between the trees as Raziel landed softly beside him, unable to see anything amiss.

"Kain?" His lieutenant also turned, considering the forest.

"Something is following us." He explained calmly. "But I do not know what."

"Nor I." Raziel flexed his claws. "But I feel it too. The swamp is strangely quiet."

The boy was entirely correct, Kain realized. Rather than the low level chaos of animal noises he usually accustomed with the thick vegetation, the place was as peaceful; as a chapel. He listened keenly to the hush, trying to determine than nature of the threat. The freakish weather couldn't be the sole cause. The storm had blown off hours ago, and had spared the region any particular damage. If anything, the beasts ought to have been more active than usual as they re-emerged from their hiding places. Instead the whole of the valley felt poised, waiting. Kain hissed softly, annoyed at the sense of anticipation.

A faint rattle caught his attention. The sound, like the chattering of ancient jawbones, was echoed first left, then right, then in a growing chorus on all sides. Kain frowned, unable to place the haunting sound. Something in it tickled his memory, but he couldn't remember where he had heard it before. Perhaps it was some fragment of Raziel's consciousness that he had absorbed in communing with the sword, and not his own recollection at all? He didn't think they were quite that badly entwined yet. But it was a possibility. The dry clatter of teeth died away with the shift in the wind, almost convincing him that it was a natural phenomena. Kain stared into the trees and waited. Patience was rewarded by another guilty sounding rattle, closer than before. Just as one faded, another one sounded, the phantom noise seeming to close in on them one yard at a time. Raziel hissed softly at his side, drawing his sword as he too hunted the source of the oddity.

Strangely it was the smell that gave them away. The faint overtone of brimstone, and the vanilla-sweet tang of corpse-rot mixed with the acidic scent Kain had come to attribute to the Hylden's unique brand of magic. The walls between dimensions had grown thin, he concluded. Too thin to hold against a concerted effort.

_Hylden._

The Soul Reaver's pulse of information was almost clinical as he slowly pulled it loose from its scabbard. The sword no more surprised than he was in regards to their latest challengers. He admired the cool white flames as they languorously traveled the length of the blade and caressed his wrist. If his sword was unconcerned by their impending fight, he was hardly about to worry.

/ How will they come? / Kain projected the thought, curious to see what his child could tell him.

The translucent flames of the weapon in his hand flickered with traces of blue. He blinked as the world around him twisted and changed.

_Astral Plane_, he felt the answer even as he stared, astounded. At his feet, stretching off into the distance, were hundreds of ghostly beacons of light, some clumped together into large vortexes, others scattered everywhere across the boggy landscape. Strange misshapen creatures scrabbled and ran along the ground beneath his perch, hooting sorrowfully, falling on one another in acts of random violence. They loped around the bases of the trees seemingly oblivious to his curious stare, while above him even stranger beings floated and chased each other effortlessly in the misty air.

Curious, Kain turned to look at the vampire standing behind him. But where Raziel should have been, was only a faint shadow, the vampire was as transparent as a soap bubble in the air, frozen in time between one moment and the next. Looking down at his own hands, he found he was equally shadow-like, his movements languid against the heavy-feeling air. Clearly the living had no business existing in this place, but the Soul Reaver burned as brightly as ever in his hand, its fire all the more real in the dreamlike realm. The blade flickered at him as if impatient with his distraction. _Portals, Kain. See the shadows?_

His eye was drawn to a different sort of movement on the floor of the swamp. Even in this realm of ghosts, it seemed there was yet another level, deeper still. For there were wraiths amongst the solid-seeming creatures of the world, green-tinted clouds of darkness emerging from all sides and skittering towards the various fonts of light energy littering the valley floor.

_Death leaves a passage for the spirit. _ The knowledge flowed silently upwards from the sword to his subconscious. He'd have mistaken the revelation for his own, if not for the uniquely Raziel-like tang of irony. Kain watched, impressed, as one shadow after another was absorbed into the vortices.

"Kain! Revenants!" Raziel, the new one, sounded like he was miles away. Kain blinked and shook his head, remembering that what he was looking at was no hypothetical exercise. The Soul Reaver understood his desire even as he wondered how to break free of the enchanted vision. The world twisted slightly as reality reasserted itself, leaving him once again in the plane he was most familiar with. "Kain?! What has possessed you?"

"I'm fine." He rolled his shoulders, dismissing his lieutenant's anxiety. Eyes automatically seeking out the space where the shadows had fled, he was impressed to see that there was a visible result. All around them, corpses of the long-dead unlucky were pushing themselves free of the mud and loam. Skins tanned brown by their long soak in the peat, or missing altogether from where the maggots had worked, the formerly human bodies crawled from their resting places and slowly gained their feet. Looking up at their observation tower with hungry eyes, the corpses crouched and stared hungrily. Green auras burned brightly in the empty eye-sockets as the Hylden navigated their crude substitute-bodies, unable, or unwilling to confront him directly.

"Fascinating." He remarked to himself.

"With all due respect lord, there are better times to meditate." Raziel scolded, studying him with a worried look. "It was as if you didn't even hear me."

"I was studying our visitors' means of arrival." Kain mused, still intrigued by the layers unseen in their world. It occurred to him that his Raziel, being neither dead nor alive, had probably been able to see both layers at once, for some time. It explained several of his more esoteric feats in defeating his brothers, if nothing else. What marvels had the boy witnessed in the intangible realm? What monsters? He frowned, considering the effort it would require for the sword to share those nuances with him now. "It was most educational."

"Perhaps you can study it further, after the threat has passed?" The vampire offered, ducking a bolt of green energy thrown from the crowd gathering below. "Revenants are a modest nuisance, it is true. But in such numbers as these, it is best not to be distracted. Even low-level fiends like these can be dangerous if opportunity is given."

"Do not imagine, Raziel; that I need instruction from you on how to fight." Kain raised an eyebrow at his lieutenant, wondering if he was being serious. "I am not without some experience in these matters."

"I-" The vampire flinched and bowed his head. "I meant no disrespect."

Kain reached out and caught the vampire by the collar, yanking the man out of the way of another angry spattering of glyph energy. Raziel hadn't noticed he was in the new line of fire; too busy being cowed to give due consideration to the enemy. Crouching next to him on the plinth Kain hissed his annoyance. The urge to cuff him upside the head the way he had often done in the past was ignorable for the moment. The last thing he wanted was another demonstration of cringing from the vampire. It was bad enough to witness it when unintentional. Kain settled for shaking the man gently by the collar before letting go. "Enough child. I was absent-minded, you corrected me. You were overzealous, I corrected you. Now, let's clear this rabble and get on with our afternoon?"

"At once, Kain." Raziel blinked, expression shifting from fearful to eager with characteristic quickness. Timing himself to fall between glyph blasts, he launched himself into the air, rapidly gaining height until he was out of reach of the longer-range attacks. Kain made ready his own offensive by the simple expedient of stepping off of the side of the shattered watch-tower, landing in the midst of a muttering crowd of corpses before they could react.

"Time to die." He advised them calmly, swinging the Soul Reaver around in a tight arc. The first two fiends the blade came in contact with seemed to explode inwards as their souls were pulled irresistibly into the sword's fire. Their brittle screams were akin to the dry coughing cries of ravens as they dissolved. The next several emaciated bodies in the path of his sword were maimed in more conventional ways, green ichors and the odd limb falling to the ground as the blade chewed through papery flesh and dusty bone.

Driving the Soul Reaver down into the twitching body of the corpse closest to his feet, he felt the blade's hum of contentment as it fed on the alien essence. Human, vampire or Hylden, it seemed to be much the same to his former-lieutenant. Kain wondered if the blade could even tell the difference, or if they were all the same, at some fundamental level. Did it matter, the origin of the spirit? It would make an interesting topic of enquiry for some philosopher, some day. He would have to remember to set some energetic young fledgling to work on the question if he lived long enough to care.

Kain turned to tackle the next wave of annoyances when a sudden gust heralded the return of his absent lieutenant. The winged vampire dropped like a stone from the shadowy canopy above, wings tucked tight against his back as he dove talons-first, into the center of another clump of animated corpses. The Hylden hissed and wailed as he threw them against one another, beheading and bisecting several with quick strokes of his blade. Pleased with the easy competence with which the knight moved Kain was forced again to wonder what it was about the vampire that his alternate-self so despised. To choose Dumah, of all creatures, over this one? It made no sense. He would as soon dismiss the choicest of drink in favor of attempting to consume a fistful of mud.

Raziel fought on, unaware of his admiration, buffeting two creatures that sought to best him from behind with his massive wings, twisting around to snap another litch's neck with his free hand. Standing in a decimated circle of groaning corpses, the knight studied the ground beneath him with an annoyed expression. Tucking his wings in close, gave up any further fight in favor of catching his breath.

Kain called down lightening on a fresh swarm cresting the hillside. "Raziel?" He reminded the knight that the fight was still ongoing.

"I am aware." The vampire replied grimly.

Arms and heads erupted from the soft loam all around the templar's feet as a new batch of Hylden found their way through the gates between realities. For every one litch Kain fed to the Reaver, it seemed four more were crawing free of the muck around Raziel.

Their chattering whispers were unintelligible, sounding like the clicking of a horde of desiccated locusts.

Still Raziel stood, wings ruffling slightly as he glared at his stalkers, seeming to dare them to come closer. Kain cursed his lieutenant, wondering what earth the vampire was thinking. Weak they were, but only a fool fought twenty at once. One was bound to get a lucky hit. Determined to get to his ally's side before the boy was entirely swamped by the maddened pit-spawn, he carved his way through a particularly ugly example of false-resurrection. The corpse attempting to stop him was practically faceless, the teeth marks of some long-ago animal marring the exposed skull bones. The Reaver sheered through the twisted corpse like it was mere straw and air.

Pushing forward, Kain beat off a dog pile's worth of idiotic corpses, still no nearer to his found-child than before. For an instant he caught a glimpse of red and silver, the vampire almost entirely hidden by the churning mass of creatures surrounding him. Raising his sword to call down some sort of defensive around his lieutenant, he was nearly blown backwards when a clap of explosive heat swept across the marsh. He raised a hand to ward the blistering heat off his face, recognizing Raziel's fire summon, this time at closer quarters than before. The mass of Hylden caught within the first several meters of the blast vaporized with cries of despair.

Kain felt the Reaver flicker with magic as it responded to the sudden powerful heat radiating off his ally. The itch of the scorching air on his knuckles immediately subsided to a vague sensation of warmth as the sword's aura wrapped him in a protective cocoon. Their enemies had no such defense. Holding the flames in close to his body, Raziel simply paced forward, aura burning hotter with each passing moment until it was an almost-blue nimbus. The air itself burned on contact with his magic. His sword glowed cherry red with the heat of his elemental affinity. Raziel himself was apparently unhampered by his summon; moving easily as he struck some of the stronger Hylden back and down, setting them alight.

Glancing between burning sword, and flame-wreathed knight, Kain shook his head at the shared theme. Man and blade were truly one and the same. As powerful as the trick was in dispatching the wretched creatures they fought, the vampire ran a serious risk of torching the entire swamp if he wasn't careful. Using his own magic, Kain called down lightening on the tail end of the mob, driving them forward into Raziel's fire, or scurrying distractedly into his own blade's path. Between two fates equally terrible, the Hylden's nerve soon broke. Several of the corpses simply dissolved of their own will as their spirits retreated to the safety of the underworld, the rest were soon dispatched.

Just as suddenly as the winged vampire's fire had begun, it was quelled. Raziel lifted a hand and clenched his fingers into a fist, seeming to draw his flames into him with a mental command. The clear mastery of the element was enough to make him grin. Man, swamp, and smoldering prey were simultaneously extinguished with an audible hiss. The smell of scorched earth hung in the air, but no further combustion seemed to be in the offing. Kain sighed in relief, not wanting to inflict further injury on Vorador's not-so-distant home than Moebius' thugs had already done. There was every chance the old fool would be back here sooner than later, if Janos cooperated. He didn't want to be the one to explain to the old vampire exactly how it came to pass that his mansion was just so much charred cinder.

Control of elemental fire was a rare and dangerous talent for a vampire to have. But to also be able to extinguish it just as easily? That was a knack that ought to have proved truly priceless.

If nothing else, it was a trick that he himself was unable to duplicate, certainly one he'd never seen his Raziel accomplish. This Raziel had made the summon, and the subsequent dismissal, appear childishly simple. Perhaps that was what had disturbed his Kain so in the distant future? A vampire who could not only unleash an elemental catastrophe, but steer and subdue it at will…? Certainly, handling such a subordinate would require some care, but it wouldn't be outside the realm of the possible. Especially not when the vampire in question was a biddable as this Raziel was.

"So, your control works both ways. That is indeed a rare talent." Kain voiced his approval mildly. Unable to let such a feat go uncommented upon, but not wanting to praise too highly. He forced himself to appear disinterested as he scanned the area for fresh prey.

Raziel opened his fingers, releasing a curl of smoke into the air, before turning to him with a hesitant smile. "If you say it is, it must be."

"A troublesome skill to use, when your allies are as flammable as your enemies, I imagine." Kain sheathed his blade with a snort of amusement.

The vampire looked at him with sudden alarm. "You were-"

"Unharmed." He brushed some of the blown cinder off his gauntlets. "Do not fear on my account."

"You are invincible." Raziel agreed softly, flipping his wings and planting his sword in the baked mud to adjust his armor. "I confess, I had rather thought you would be, or I should not have risked the magic. The fiends seemed disagreeably determined to return to life when dispatched by blade alone. They were not so keen a second time."

"As they were dead to begin with, I suppose decapitation wasn't a severe handicap for them." Kain snorted softly again. "A pathetic fight. Truly. What could they have hoped to achieve?"

"A delay perhaps?" Raziel tilted his head and considered their surroundings. "Or perhaps a goad, to test our resolve?"

"My resolve, they cannot possibly question." Kain grimaced. "But they are now in no doubt of your strength. They won't underestimate you so badly next time."

"You were not surprised." The vampire flipped his wings again, belting his sword.

"No."

The dark haired man smiled at the simple answer, "I suppose not. If your Raziel was at all like you described, my poor magics must seem mere child's play by comparison."

Kain shrugged, kicking one likely looking corpse before spying a twitching creature behind a boulder caught his attention. He moved to put it out of its misery. "I would not say that. You are different, in that sense, than he, but that does not automatically define you as weaker."

"Tell me of your Raziel." The winged vampire rubbed the blood away from his jaw where a fiend had nicked him. Following him as he sunk his claws into the last remaining Hylden, his lieutenant questioned him cautiously. "Was he anything like me?"

"In appearance, certainly." Kain conceded, snapping the spine of a survivor with a methodical wrench. He cast the corpse into the deeper water of the bog, letting nature take its course. "Personality-wise? I don't think the two of you would have gotten along."

"He would have thought me useless." Raziel frowned at his own failing.

"He was a firm believer in self-determination." Kain mused. "Strength of spirit, more so than of arm. Although it could be said he had both in full measure. He would have found your patient tolerance of the intolerable… boring."

Raziel seemed to meditate on that a moment, studying the woods around them. Mouth twisting into a resigned grimace he shrugged, and leapt into the air, letting his wings carry him upwards. Catching the humid breeze, the vampire drifted in a lazy circle over their scorched little clearing before gliding slightly ahead along the route they had been traveling. Circling again over the next dry patch of land, he waited for Kain to catch up before asking his next question.

"Was he your favorite?"

Kain looked up at where the vampire hung effortlessly above him, wondering if the creature had ego enough to be jealous of his alternate-self. The question sounded innocent enough, but he recognized something familiar, testing, in the too-disinterested tone.

"Yes." He answered; grimly curious to see where the boy was going with his idle interrogation.

Raziel swept sideways between the towering trunks of two particularly impressive trees, weaving over and around the mossy drapes before banking sharply and settling on one to wait for him. Sharp claws on his fingers and toes bit easily into the thick bark of the ancient tree, allowing him to easily hang on despite the vertical surface. The dark haired knight rested against the mossy surface in calm defiance of gravity. Clinging to the trunk like some sort of arboreal fiend, the vampire looked down at him with predatory yellow eyes. For a moment, Kain could easily see the duality in the man. Something terribly lonely, almost feral, was just beneath the surface of the vampire's subservient veneer. As hungry for information as he was for praise, Raziel would not, perhaps could not, help himself but to ask of his alter-ego's nature. "Why?"

Both drawn by the familiar spark of obstinate determination – so painfully missing from the man until now – and alarmed by the realization that he was responsible for the vampire's partial awaking of the spirit; Kain considered his answer carefully, using the treacherous swamplands between them as an excuse to hold his tongue until he drew abreast with his companion.

"Raziel was… special…" Kain looked upwards and matched the vampire's stare for a moment before finding the dank forest a safer place to rest his eyes. He did not find the absolute focus in the creature's stare any more comfortable than ever he had enjoyed similar looks from his own lieutenant. There had always an undertone of being measured, in his favorite's captivated silence that was worrying. Strange to find it still was able to get under his skin after all this time.

The trend of the Reaver's tugs carried him to higher ground away from the fetid sludge of the valley floor. The path curled up and over a grassy hillside. Passing under and around his companion's perch, he could feel the vibration of tightly repressed energy seething beneath the vampire's silent looks. The winged-vampire felt much like Raziel, his Raziel had in the beginning, all boundless energy, grace, and wild fanaticism. What a joy it had been to watch him fight once again, irregardless of the fact that this one belonged to a different Kain entirely. He shook his head and dismissed the idle urge to reach up and ruffle the vampire's hair as he moved past.

"He was interesting." He suddenly wanted to explain to the boy what it was that had so impressed him with his own Raziel. But the words caught in his throat. How could he possibly synopsize in a few sentences a man whom had served, fought, and then gambled everything on him? There were no pat poetic expressions he could utter that could encompass even a fraction of his rarity. In all the world there had been only one Raziel. No one else had ever come close. Only one vampire had dared to be so insufferable, invaluable, incalculable, and in the end, integral to his very existence.

Kain shook his head again and looked forward towards an odd little dead-end of a clearing at the end of the trail. A blank wall of stone stood nestled between the trees. With the Reaver's help he could easily perceive the ancient illusion. Beneath the wavering false-surface, lay an ornately carved door; a secret passage for one with the appropriate key. The ancient, posing with arms and wings outstretched, seemed to be gazing down at him with world-weary candor. It too reminded him of what he had lost.

"None of my other children were ever interesting." He finished his thought absently, stepping forwards towards his goal.

"That's an impressive carving." Raziel overlooked his woolgathering, distracted by their destination. The vampire launched off of his perch against the tree to sail past him, landing in a crouch at the base of the wall. "An ancient? They are usually portrayed as blue, are they not?"

"They are indeed." Kain paused, realizing that the boy could see as he did, unaided. "You can see the mural?"

"Yes, Kain." Raziel turned to him, surprised he had asked.

The vampire's calm acceptance of the hidden shrine made Kain think back. "You saw the Elder God as well. At the lake."

"Very clearly." His lieutenant made a face. "Shouldn't I have?"

"I don't know." Kain mused. "But no one else, save I… and Raziel, ever have."

"But I am also Raziel, am I not?" The handsome man tilted his head, smiling at the paradox. "Why should it surprise you?"

"I don't know." Kain felt there was something obvious he was missing, but the mystery refused to become clearer. Staring at their destination, he got an inkling of an idea. "Do me a courtesy, child. Place your hand on the Reaver emblem on the door?"

"Will it hurt?" Raziel raised an eyebrow, considering the painted symbol on the stone.

Kain shook his head. "Unlikely." Standing back, he watched the vampire approach the ancient portal, studying it curiously before reaching out to place his hand on the markings matching a handprint at the center of the door. The form may not have been as proscribed, but the soul as a good a match as any. Dust and lichens scattered as the stone slabs gave way with an occult chime, rumbling back into the hillside to reveal the hall beyond.

A colonnade lined the dark passage. The twin ranks of massive pillars faded deep into the earth leading the eye downwards into a subterranean temple. Ancient carvings in the polished floor demonstrated the age of the construction, despite its pristine appearance. Small fires burned in braziers close to the ceiling at regular intervals, their source, and means of staying lit, unclear. If Janos had been with them, undoubtedly he would have explanations enough for any historian. Kain wondered what in particular the ancient would have made of his companion. Had Janos even realized, possessed as he was, who exactly he had been fighting? It was an interesting question. One he doubted he'd get the chance to ask.

"Interesting." Kain critiqued, finding his new Raziel a better match for his old one than he could have hoped.

"It seems attuned to vampires, lord." Raziel shrugged.

"No." Kain disagreed. "Just to you, I think."

His ally stared openly as he walked past, studying first his hand, and then the doorway, as he was left behind.

"Do try to keep up, Raziel." Kain turned back, realizing he was alone in his progress. The dark haired vampire blinked and hurried after him, turning himself, when the doors swung silently closed again as soon as he cleared their circumference. "Very interesting." He murmured, amused by the demonstration.

"What does it mean?" His replacement child looked at him with a frown. "How is it this shrine is aware of me? Surely it would be you that was meant to find it, you knew just where to look!"

"Only because I was told." Kain lead the way further in and down, following the sloping corridor deeper in to the shrine. The regularly placed lights flickered in the darkness, providing crude illumination between the columns. "Raziel knew of this place."

"How?" The handsome vampire trailed after him, as full of questions as ever his predecessor was.

"Probably because he was meant to." Kain turned a corner, only to find himself nose-to-shadow with a floating wraith.

Similar in nature to the annoyances that had plagued him in Moebius' fortress and later at the citadel, it seemed little more than an inky black cloud with a fistful of light where its heart ought to have been. The creature lashed out at him with a ball of green fire, alerting a swarm of others with a whistling bark. Within a breath, the entire swath or corridor was blanketed in darkness, the hovering clouds emerging from all surfaces around them, growing spindly arms and spectral talons as they closed in.

The small ones had only one heart to their names, and were weaklings barely worth the trouble when taken singly. The larger shadows were the greater concern, he spotted several with not one, but three heart-sized balls of light shining in their chests. Concentrating on those, Kain drew his blade, letting the Reaver's fire warn them of their impending doom.

It was an ugly skirmish. Incorporeal though they were, their claws cut at him in several small but annoying ways. His sword did a far better job of injuring them then they could ever hope to repay, however. He took the opportunity to vent some frustration. Smashing the Reaver repeatedly into the last of the stubborn three-hearted phantoms and smiling as it disintegrated silently. Turning, Kain prepared to finish mopping up, only to find the rest of his prey long gone. Raziel stood behind him, guarding his flank, sword dangling loosely from his fingers as he snarled at the darkness. Apparently the knight had frustrations of his own to vent, exhibiting more personality in the annoyed twist of his lips than he had so far in their acquaintance.

Catching his eye, Kain found himself troubled by the change. His conscience whispering that maybe he'd have been better off leaving well enough alone. What possible use could rousing and turning this Raziel against his lord serve? The boy had been content enough with his lot in life, before he had interfered.

A particularly ugly thought drifted up from his subconscious. He was the better Kain. That was why. Why shouldn't he want this Raziel for himself? Clearly his alter-ego in the future had no use for the knight. This handsome, winged, powerful, well spoken vampire would do very well as a replacement for the one he had lost, wouldn't he?

Something in Raziel's eyes seemed to promise that it would take very little to sway the knight into feeling as deep a devotion to him as ever his old one had. Kain pursed his lips, remembering all too easily how a different Raziel had once looked at him with such zealous passion. How pleasant it would be, to feel the warmth of such regard again, after so much time alone.

"What happened to him? Your Raziel?" Seeming to read his thoughts, the dark haired vampire paced closer, feeling the unconscious pull as well as he did.

For a moment Kain was willing to allow it, wanting with cruel intensity what he had thrown away so long ago. Only the shiver of the Reaver against his back kept him from reaching out to accept the implied invitation. He forced himself to remember where and when he was, grounding himself in the present.

"You speak of him in the past tense. I assume he is dead?" The vampire's question provided the necessary burst of guilt needed to bring him to his senses.

"Yes." Kain crushed his lingering impulse to subvert his only-temporary lieutenant into a more permanent role with the memory of exactly how badly he had used his last Raziel. Glaring at the empty corridor, he could not meet the man's gaze, furious at himself for forgetting, even for an instant, the debt he owed.

If the sword had supposed for an instant he was tempted to forget about it in favor of another, more pliant version, it would undoubtedly make its displeasure known in a myriad of ugly ways. To claim a second copy of the remarkable vampire for himself was both greedy, and stupid. There were paradoxes enough in this timeline without his adding to the chaos. He resolved to send the knight back as soon as Kain was found, before he did something absurdly foolish. "Yes. He died."

"How?" Raziel simply stalked around him until he was compelled to meet the templar's stare again, unwilling to let him look away.

"Turel and Dumah." Kain felt the empty space where his heart ought to have been twisting in on itself with the half-lie. To tell the vampire the truth however would result in a fiendishly complicated explanation, and most likely, the loss of a valuable ally in his fight to correct the time-stream. The truth was something he could ill afford. "They thought without him in the way, they would be elevated. They were wrong."

"Did you kill them?" Raziel's eyes burned in the dim darkness of the corridor.

Kain rubbed his face, knowing that they were wasting time, but feeling how tenuous the vampire's grip on control was. Like a starving fledgling chained just out of reach of blood, the boy had been kept leashed by his own self-doubt for far too long. In giving the Raziel the validation he had always been refused, Kain had opened the door to a lifetime of repressed passion. Either he would check the knight now, and direct his energy in a useful direction, or the man would probably be driven mad by the realization that the Scion he had dedicated his entirely thwarted life to was not at all worthy of his self-sacrifice.

"There was no need." He sighed. "They died. All of them. A long time ago. Raziel was merely the first amongst ten thousand vampires to fall."

That at least got the boy's attention. Raziel drew back as if stung, expression relaxing from something uncanny to his usual hesitance as he responded instinctively to the regret that Kain allowed his voice to carry. Another step backwards and the lieutenant seemed to fold up into himself; a fire banked, if only for the moment. "I- I am sorry."

"It's nothing." Kain pinched the bridge of his nose, feeling a headache forming.

Yet again he was the author of a Raziel's damnation, if only in a round-about way. Never again would the boy be able to passively agree to the abuse his master inflicted on him when returned home. God only knew what future lay in store for a vampire who refused to bend-neck to the insufferable jackass of the Kain that dwelled in that world. Likely it was nothing good. And yet he had to go back. There was no other way. For the vampire to stay in the past was a sheer impossibility.

He rubbed his face, feelings confused by a growing sense of kinship with his new Raziel. Kain hadn't intended to grow so attached. A sign of extreme age perhaps, he had grown overly sentimental. Forcing the useless speculation aside, he turned from the conversation, letting the slope of the hall guide him lower. "Come. We are nearly at our goal."


	6. Chapter 6

**Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King**

(A continuation fan-fiction for Legacy of Kain: Defiance)

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Note:It's hard to find a text character for section breaks that this website won't filter! We'll try '8's for now :-)

Big thanks to readers who took the time to comment, I'm glad to know this strange little yarn is interesting for others aside from myself. This chapter in particular took a few tries to get into the shape I wanted. Hopefully ch7 will be along in a few days, so stay tuned!

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/../- implies vampiric 'whisper' a.k.a. telepathy/mental projection.

The Soul Reaver isn't capable of speech as such, but I gave it dialog anyway to show that Kain can interpret its wordless snark without difficulty? I have no idea. Just go with it.

**The End: Chapter 6-**

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"For a thousand years the vampire race has withered and faded away. Even their greatest champion, Vorador, could not overcome his fate." The deep voice was resonant as it carried into the hall, seeming to encompass all the wisdom of heaven and earth in its measured tones. Accompanied by the ever-present sound of lapping water, and the scent of wet stone, the elder god's litany provided ample warning that they had arrived at their destination.

"He was not the chosen sire of the new age, but merely a shadowy remnant of the old one." The unseen abomination continued. "It is your duty, Kain. Your mission, if you will accept it, to reclaim this world for a new bloodline! A purer one! Through your grace, a new age will be revealed…"

Kain pressed himself against the carved stone filigree around the doorframe, wondering if his stealth was of any use against a potentially precognizant creature made entirely of eyes. Surely the fiend knew he was there? Or perhaps it was too busy soliloquizing to realize its audience had grown? The squid did seem to adore the sound of its own voice. To the beast's credit, it was a well spoken monstrosity.

"And my Pillar shall be whole again? I will be Balance?" The younger Kain was lapping up the doggerel like fine brandy; clearly hanging on the false-god's every word. He snorted at the fledgling's earnest attention. He had never paid half so much mind to any of his tutors as a boy. As a newly-arisen vampire, Vorador had practically had to break his legs to make him sit still and listen. Maybe there was something to the false-prophet's captivating voice after all.

"And the world restored to righteousness." The elder god's paternal tones set his teeth on edge as much as the fledgling's shallow vanity.

Raziel moved with silent grace to mirror his position on the other side of the door, leaning slightly into the light to get a glimpse at the room beyond. Grey wings stretched out behind him and held flat against the wall, he looked very much like yet another carving in relief. An ancient poised in the act of taking flight. His pale skin all but glowed in the stronger light of the central chamber as he puzzled out the source of the voices. Kain watched the vampire, curious to see his reaction to the other Kain's appearance.

The winged knight didn't disappoint him. Raziel's eyes widened in surprise as he caught sight of his young-alter-ego chatting with the unseen god, glancing between the new vampire, and his hiding place several times, mentally making a tally. He spared a glance of his own, seeing that the fledgling was very much as he had been the day before. Standing assertively in the center of the shrine as he debated with his invisible mentor, the vampire made a very pretty picture, all starkly contrasting light and dark against the earthy tones of the room around him. There was no sign of wetting on the youth's pale face and hands, his black armor as glossy and pristine as ever. However the fiend had transported him, the water had not managed to do him harm.

Raziel hissed softly, pressing himself backwards into the shadows of his hiding place, expression showing his confusion and distress. The knight looked over at him again, eyes beseeching an explanation. Kain sighed softly. He had his answer. The lord and master that his new-Raziel served, was undoubtedly some future variation off of his handsomer, and stupider, past-self. It was only natural, and fair, that it be the case… It wasn't like he could go forward into the future again, heartless as he was. But still it depressing to realize that all his hopes rested in the hands of a mere yearling that, it was evidenced, still had a high probability of making a complete hash of his hard work.

At least he could ensure that the specific future he had plucked Raziel from would never come to pass. A moment's explanation of the Soul Reaver's nature to its new owner, preferably out of his current ally's earshot, would go a long way towards correcting matters, he hazarded. He gestured to the knight to hold his position until bid otherwise. Not wanting to further confuse the matter by having Raziel dive in and either kowtow to, or rail at, the youth who shared his lord's face.

"So why tarry here any longer? My course is plain. You have told me what is required, and as you have foreseen Nosgoth is already wracked with cataclysm. Why do I dally when there is no time to lose?"

"The fiend hunting you has an ally, Kain. A creature akin to your noble ancestors follows in his shadow, never more than a step behind. But unlike them, he is unquestionably mad, tainted by your nemesis' curse. Together they may prove difficult, even for you, to surpass. First we shall separate them. Then you can do as you are destined to."

"I fear no man." The fledgling folded his arms, proud. "Let them come together, or singly. It makes no difference to me."

"In that case, you'll get your wish." Kain gestured to Raziel his intention, even as he spoke the words aloud. Stepping out of the shadows to glare down the creature he had been. "For I intend to save you from yourself, vampire. Regardless of your own foolish desires."

"Grab him and seek higher ground." He hissed to the man behind him, feeling more than seeing Raziel springing into the air and over his head. The vampire navigated the wide doorway with a snap of his wings and dove for the platform before the false-god had time to untangle so much as a tentacle from the base of the Pillars. Kain leapt the watery moat at the same time, slicing through two of the massive limbs and blasting a third back into the water with a bolt of force, determined that this time the cephalopod would not get one of its greedy coils around his prey.

For his part, young Kain merely gaped as Raziel pounced, flaming sword knocked free of his stunned grip to spin out of reach on the stone platform. Not waiting for permission, the winged knight scooped his future lord up and vaulted again; dodging a newly-arrived tentacle and spreading wing back towards the relative safety of the tunnel. No sooner than Kain dared feel a hope of his wild-plan's success, then a green coil lashed from the surface in a spray of water, striking at the arches of the door with titanic strength. Raziel banked off as the stones crumbled downwards, sealing any chance of escape by that route. Stymied, the knight and the fledgling had no choice but to come to ground again, landing next to him at the center of the platform, awaiting the inevitable battle.

"Foolish Kain." The ancient oracle chuckled softly. "What did you hope to accomplish? You walk willfully to your death! All that is required now is for the Scion to defeat his Nemesis, and reclaim his sword. The world will be restored as your phantom-life ends… and you even save him the trouble of looking for you."

"Nemesis?" Kain raised an eyebrow, turning slowly to keep pace with the twisting tentacles emerging from the lake. "Audron is defeated. Moritanius is dead. King William died a martyr fifty years ago. The creature, or creatures, composing Hash'a'gik are consumed by my blade. The Nemesis is no more."

Young Kain struggled to free himself, but as before, it seemed he was no match for a mature vampire. Raziel easily subdued the youth's frustrated thrashing, pinning the fledgling's arms to his sides in a firm hug, and ignoring the hissed curses the youth spat at him. Looking from the youth's bitter expression to Raziel's grimly determined one, the implication of the 'oracle's' words slowly became clear. Kain stared back at the water with a sinking feeling. "You are implying that in setting myself against you, I have become the Nemesis, the Dark Entity, that is recorded in history?"

"You have always been the Nemesis, Kain." The pretender god laughed again. "It is only your own false history that tells you otherwise. The Wheel of Fate has rejected you, and so you are blind to its course, both past and future. My course. You refused to undertake the roll provided, so I simply found you a different one, more in keeping with your meddlesome habits."

"I will slay you even now, evil one!" His alternate self crowed, twisting vainly against Raziel's firm grip. "Tell your feather-brained familiar to release me, and we shall settle this once and for all! I will show the Pillars which Kain is the rightful one!"

"Hold your tongue boy or I'll cut it out." He glared back at the blond fool. "Children should be silent unless spoken to."

"You dare call me a child?!"

"Do not speak ill of your better, boy." Raziel hissed into the fledgling's ear, furious. The youth drew breath to protest further, but the knight was in no mood to brook disobedience. Adjusting his hold so that he could muffle the vampire with his hand, he quelled any forthcoming outburst. Kain smirked, seeing the look of frustrated ire from his prior-self. It was a good thing the boy hadn't caught a good look at the vampire before being caught from behind, or there might be repercussions in future. Raziel too he would be obliged to explain to the youth when all was said and done, he reminded himself. Either that or come up with a very convincing lie.

Nodding grimly, the dark haired templar signaled he could keep the idiot quiet and out of harm's way, for the moment. "What now, my lord? We appear to be trapped."

"Ah, dear sweet Raziel. Returned yet again… And just as enthralled as ever by your murderer's pretty-lies no doubt." The self-named-oracle sighed patiently. "But it has always been so, has it not? Free you are, and free you will be, vampire. Free to be the dupe of this pretender for all eternity. Ever the loyal dog trotting at your master's heels. A slave to his every perverted whim. If only there was time, such a sordid tale I could tell you. "

"It knows me?" The dark haired vampire flinched as the voice from the shadowy water addressed him directly. Turning to Kain, the knight frowned, confused. "Why does it call you murderer?"

Kain hissed, guessing the false-god's intent. Of course the monster would name his child for all and sundry to hear. It had nothing to lose by doing so, and everything to gain. Turning the fledgling against his future ally was only one possible outcome. The immediate danger was more pressing. If it could talk his replacement child into defecting, his odds of victory would become considerably less favorable. If the so-called Oracle was even half-so-omnipotent as it pretended to be, it would have a catalog of his sins long enough to convince anyone that he was the incarnation of evil.

"The beast is a consummate actor, Raziel. It will say anything to trick people into being its pawns. Pay it no mind." Kain played the only card he could against the unseen voice. Swinging the Reaver in a wide arc, he cut through a tentacle that dared to curl too close. Circling behind his lieutenant he carved off the tip of another muscled rope that was trying to intercept from behind. "Keep to the center of the platform, child. The creature has a limited reach."

"Now now, Kain. I am not the one who has lied to your newest sycophant. I have nothing to hide."

"Nothing?" He barked, grimly entertained. "What of your curious ability to council all sides as your own? One moment you are crowing about the ultimate defeat of the vampire race to the humans. Now you pretend to groom its next savior by cosseting the last vampire? What is that, if not a grand charade? If there were a Hylden here, no doubt you would tell the mad-creature that you were its god as well!"

"I am the Hub of the Wheel, Kain. All life and death must bow down to me." The creature shifted beneath the water, sending small waves sloshing over the edges of the platform. "Even those deluded fools now long-banished."

"Not so banished as you might hope." Kain scoffed. "They're coming back. And, I may say, they haven't grown any sweeter on you during their long exile."

"And yet they can do nothing. Just like you." The god laughed darkly. The stage they stood on trembled with the movement of the massive body against the subterranean lakebed. Hanging forlorn from where they were embedded in the ceiling, several of the shattered Pillars shed a fine dusting of crumbs into the already dank air. "I am everything. I am everywhere. Do you honestly think anything you do now matters? It is all according to my plan."

"Even this?" Kain bared his teeth, holding the purified Soul Reaver out from his body in challenge to the unseen.

"Of course." The voice was jovial again with the pronouncement, never a good sign. Kain cursed as the room was suddenly framed by heavy tentacles. A virtual forest of dripping tendrils of muscle wavered and swayed as they broke through the surface of the lake, obscuring the murals and sliding in and out of the shadows cast by the broken Pillars. Instead of attacking directly, they smashed outwards instead, caving in each and every one of the frescos lining the circular chamber. A priceless visual history of Janos' tribe disintegrated into crumbled plaster and pigment, raining down into the murky water. Raziel winced at the callous destruction and hunched forward, folding his wings around his shoulders to shield himself and his captive from the spray of dust and gravel.

Kain too mourned the lost of the paintings, but was more interested in the meaning of the watery beast's gesture. Behind the now shattered walls were a series of small chambers, hidden for a millennium or more. In each and every cavern, a pair of eyes illuminated the darkness. A ring of bull headed, statues, each with four arms, stood waiting. Seemingly carved out of basalt, they were rough hewn and ugly in construction, reminding him almost of Turel's early evolution with their cloven hooves and backwards-bent knees. Each of the brutes held an ancient weapon in one pair of hands, the other set free of props were posed as if striking the air with bare fists. Pole axes, war hammers, spears and glaives gleamed in the dusty light of the magical lamps.

As he watched, a flickering blue aura surrounded their stony hides. One of the beasts tossed its head, the movement very reminiscent of the animal it was patterned after. The others slowly animated as well, fingers clutching at weapons, nostrils expanding as they huffed and snorted, a parody of life. Kain twisted, counting the giant constructs. Nine totems; one for each of the Pillars? It seemed fitting enough. Perhaps they were some final protection built into the shrine by its desperate makers so many years ago. They seemed more than willing to defend against even vampires now. He did not put it past the watery pretender to have overridden their enchantments to his own ends.

"Stay with the fledgling and leave this to me." He commanded his lieutenant when the man would have released his hostage. "The beast will grab him as soon as we are too occupied to stop it. We can't afford to lose him again! Knock him out if you have to, but don't let him near the water."

As if to punctuate his ultimatum, the entire cavern shook. He hissed as the waters frothed and lapped at the platform again. Either the false-god was determined to drown them, and its pawn both, or Nosgoth itself was revolting against the new battle at the Pillars. He prayed the ancient temple would hold together long enough to allow them an escape.

With a weird chorus of cries, half of the golems lurking in the shadows vaulted forwards at the same time, four massive ox-headed, axe wielding, titans closing simultaneously on the center of the platform. Raziel wasted no time in following his edict, using the shifting of forces to his advantage. All but tucking the struggling fledgling under his arm, he mirrored their move. The knight leapt across the muddy channel and into the recently vacated cubby opened along side the chamber, claiming the pocket of rock as the most defensible position in the room.

His preemptive retreat cleared the platform of anything Kain might have worried about coming to harm when he willed the Reaver to awaken. He didn't have time to thank the vampire however, blocking first one, then two axes together with his blade.

The titanic statues leaned on their weapons, seeking to crush him with their weight. His own strength was not without merit however. Two millennia of evolution had left him more than able to resist their might. The Reaver flared and sang as it shattered the twin weapons bearing down against it. Kain recognized the basso harmonic of the sound glyph as the sword's usual shriek altered to suit the moment. The focused pulse of concussive energy smashed a carved arm to the elbow when one of his assailants swung a bare fist at the blade's edge. Gritting his teeth against the bone-jarring hum of magic, Kain pushed forward against his reeling prey. Following up with a series of two handed blows, he knocked first one, and then the other monster back.

A blow from behind caught him across the shoulder, distracting him and the Reaver both. By luck the glaive only caught him with an edge rather than crushing bone or pinning him. Feeling the wound open down his back, Kain dove forwards, away from the strike. He heard the whistle of a second attack behind him as it smashed down where he had stood.

Persistent bastards, he granted them. Regaining his footing, he ignored the itch of the dust in his wound as he circled the maimed statues, judging how best to close with them again. They were missing an assortment of limbs between them, it was true, but he doubted it would slow them down particularly.

The Elder God was preaching again, he distantly acknowledged the deep voiced drone as he weighed options. Raziel was seemingly in conversation with it, angrily challenging the water with his own rebuttal. He ignored the argument in favor of staying on top of his pursuers. Whatever the old squid wanted, he wasn't going to worry about until after he was confident that it wouldn't cost him his head. Raziel was showing wisdom enough to have little interest in its commentary, and the knight could keep the boy in check until they were ready to depart.

Thinking of the pair of vampires seemed to trigger a renewed offensive from his attackers. Golems bayed and stomped, charging this way and that across the platform, dodging the remains of the Pillars and sprinting from one cubby for another in a riot of beastly sound. Kain spun and ducked around two clumsy lunges, deftly outmaneuvering a statue that sought to gore him. Swatting away another random charger, he tried to keep a tally on which were wounded and which were fresh to the fight.

It seemed the heavy beasts only had so much stamina in their frenzy. One by one the golems staggered to a halt, standing where ever they came to rest, panting after their sprinting attacks. Three of the giant stone statues stood wheezing in cubbies along the wall. Four more, in various states of debilitation were on the platform with him. Kain frowned, finding two that were unaccounted for.

Working around the edge of the circular platform, he swatted the tip off of an interfering tentacle without really looking to see where it fell, intent on finding his stubborn ally's whereabouts. The bolt-hole his lieutenant had retreated to had grown a little more crowded since the last time he checked. The knight was blocking one of the stone monster's weapons with his own, arms corded with muscle as he resisted the beast's might. Shoving forward, he knocked the blade of one away in time to deflect the hit of the other with a summoned projectile of flame. The blast caught his new assailant square in the chest, knocking it back one perilous step too far. It stumbled off the edge of the floor and toppled backwards into the water, disappearing with a loud splash.

Kain had to grin at the strategy. It was a simple matter of weight after all. The golems were top heavy. Basalt might be damn near impossible to chisel, but neither was it buoyant. The lake surrounding their platform was more than deep enough to prevent anything sunken into it from easily coming back up unaided. Short of the false-god sparing a tentacle to flip its creatures back onto the platform, they would be obliged to stay down there and molder awhile. There'd be no way to know without giving it a try, he decided.

The golems already surrounding him made another spirited attempt to take his head, taking advantage of his distraction. He indulged their fury with a burst of his own, smashing them back with several glancing blows of the Reaver. Only when he had regained a modest amount of clear floor around him did he turn back to check on his lieutenant's progress. Without his stamina, or enchanted weapon, the vampire was likely at a disadvantage.

Once again bringing his sword to bear, Raziel blocked his original enemy a second time, using both arms to better resist the awesome strength of the statue's hit. Even with toe-claws scraping against the floor for purchase, the vampire was pushed backwards several inches by the blow. A small contest of strength, and the winged knight was able to deflect the titan to the side, slipping out from under its weight in order to ram the stone construct with his shoulder. The knight forced it back a precious foot, keeping between it, and the fledgling pressed against the rear wall of the cavern. Sparks danced along the templar's sword as it scraped along the statue's skin, carving chips free of the beast, but unable to pierce its dense body.

Kain spared a moment from his own fight to lend what aid he could. Reached out with his will, he grabbed the second golem in a coil of telekinetic force, yanking it backwards towards the water, sending it toppling after its friend. Raziel watched its sudden departure with a tired grin, free hand clutching at his damaged shoulder as he observed its descent. The vampire truly was in need of a change of wardrobe, Kain shook his head, amused by the random thought. His lieutenant's original layers of shirt, mail and surcoat were becoming more and more haphazard with every battle they fought. Clearly the uniform had never been designed to stand up to such abuse as the Hylden and false-god were capable of dishing out. He owed the boy a new shirt at least, if they survived this insane little battle-royal. There was no way they'd be able to prevent some questions arising when he sent the templar home, but at least he could see to it that the vampire didn't stagger out of the time streaming chamber in rags.

Luckily the vampire in question seemed wholly unconcerned about his increasingly bedraggled appearance. That was certainly a departure from his own Raziel-of-old, he considered. As a litch, Raziel had been justifiably apathetic and bitter about his appearance, but as a nobleman of the empire, his lieutenant had tended towards vain. Had he brought that version of his child back into the past, he had no doubt that the vampire wouldn't have been nearly so sanguine at the loss of his coat.

Forcing himself to focus on the action at hand, Kain glanced down into the water, following Raziel's curious gaze. It was probably too much to hope that the heavy beast crashed horns-first into the squid lurking beneath the platform. Regardless of where it ended up and how, it didn't seem inclined to make reappearance. He smirked, wondering if they had found the limit of the squid's potential. It could exploit the tools others had constructed for it, but lacked any sort of useful generative impulses. A consumer and a destroyer, with nothing in particular to give, despite claiming it was the origin of life. It was little better than a parasite; the proverbial worm in the apple.

"Behind you, Kain!" He looked up at Raziel's worried command, moving in time to dodge a spear thrust. His enemies had multiplied again since last he'd checked. Kain mentally scolded himself for wasting time with musing over how's and why's when there was a fight to be finished. Swinging the Reaver around to parry and disarm yet another construct, he had to laugh at his own reaction to the warming. How easy it was to confuse one Raziel for another now that the new one had found a measure of confidence! The vampire's voice, at first so timid and forgettable, had transformed into something eerily familiar. So much so that when the knight barked at him, he had responded purely on instinct, trusting the source of the alarm as much as the sword in his hand.

Four of the slab-formed creatures snorted and pawed at the stone as they made to charge him again. One bellowed and swung its hammer as its twin made to grab him with the two hands remaining to it. Kain let one play off the other, ducking beneath the outstretched arms just in time for the dull stone hammerhead to crash into the second fiend's face, opening a crack from eye-socket to shoulder in the enchanted stone. The third's weapon caught him in the arm as he spun to anticipate a goring from the fourth. Blood trickled, but did not run, despite the severity of the jab. His blade hummed in throaty annoyance as its magic coiled over the injury, sealing it with the speed of a thought.

Kain vaulted over the sharp horns of the closest minotaur and drove the Soul Reaver point-first into the side of the next available, trusting its magic to defeat the normally impenetrable hide. The serpentine-blade's aura wavered from blue to green as it plowed deep into the stone, earth magic warping the statue's fibers as it carved through the dense matter until the statue shattered into rubble. The explosive destruction of the one only added to the injury of the other. Already cracked and staggering, it too shattered, leaving only a pile of black rocks where it had once stood. Kain willed himself intangible, letting his body shift to a misty shadow of itself to avoid another moment of battery as he skidded away from the heart of the confusion. Getting his bearings, he had little to be pleased about. Certainly two were crushed, and two were drowned, but a fresh fiend had joined its brethren on the killing-floor.

Kain bared his teeth at the beast, summoning a kinetic burst along the Soul Reaver's edge to blow the charging creature back. His sword had been steadily gathering strength, warming to the battle, and was unstinting in its willingness to help. The radial surge of power caused a micro quake of its own, pushing the debris from his earlier kills away from where he stood, shaking dust and rubble loose from the fractured Pillars overhead. Knocking one of the monsters onto its back, its visible shockwave caught the second full in the chest, smashing it across the circular chamber and into the far wall. The statue groaned as it was pinned against the rubble-blocked passage above ground and then plummeted into the water beneath as the pressure abated.

Kain laughed, feeling the Reaver's handiwork along his skin even as it worked its deadly magic on the rest of the room. His wounds were knitting so fast he could hardly register the pain. The blade felt hot in his hand, alive with fury.

How naive he had been, all his life, thinking his sword was strong! How utterly innocent! Now that Raziel had come full circle and taken up residence within the weapon, its power was utterly unbounded. Yet again he was struck by the sensation that he was not in reality the blade's master as he had always assumed, but rather its agent. The Reaver was destined for the Scion of Balance, he had no doubt. But it did not necessarily follow that it was a passive tool for his use. As furious and stubborn as he had ever been, Raziel's soul gave the weapon a life as valid as his own. With such a sword as his tutor, even young Kain would be able to acquit himself admirably in the future. But together in the here and now? They were unstoppable.

He brought the weapon up to a guard stance, closing deliberately with the last upright golems. Two strikes were needed before he could get the angle necessary for the sword to bite into the stone. Once past the surface, the Reaver's soul stealing power took care of the rest, vanquishing his prey with stone shattering force.

The next challenger was equally uninteresting. It was barely worth the trouble of parrying; he found as he knocked its spear away and drove his weapon point-first into its chest. The green fire of the Reaver once again did its cruelly necessary work. Cracks opened throughout the statue's torso, radiating out from the blade's heart. The fissures ripped his opponent apart even as it writhed in confusion, raising its hammer to attempt to smash him in turn. The weapon dropped uselessly to the floor as limbs and torso crumbled to bits. The fiend's astral essence was drawn forth and into the voracious light of the Soul Reaver.

Turning from the corpse, Kain almost pitied the last creature to dispose of. Laid out by the force wave, it was only just beginning to regain its footing. It huffed as it righted itself, clearly worse for the wear. If the creature had possessed even the barest spark of self-awareness, it would have realized its imperative was futile. But the statue was nothing but geas and stone, and it was ignorant of what had befallen its brethren. Turning with a bellow, it too tried to gore him for lack of a better weapon. Raising his sword again, Kain locked it with the golem's long horns, twisting its head away from his body to deflect the attack and then wrenching his blade back again, snapping one of the sharp protuberances off with a flick of his wrist. The debris on the platform was considerable, but did not quite seem to tally. One beast remained unaccounted for.

Out of the corner of his eye, he found his missing last, the stone monster had opted for a softer target and set its sights on his lieutenant and fledgling. Even as he turned to consider the problem, the golem broke through Raziel's defense, smashing the vampire sideways and into a wall with a sweep of a glaive. The knight staggered and shook his head, addled as the beast made a grab for the younger Kain. To his credit, the fledgling was having none of it, and pulled out his own axes to defend against the titanic weapon the statue swung. Either he didn't realize the fiends were in the employ of his beloved oracle, or was simply demonstrating his usual self-preserving instinct by not giving over to the menacing construct. Young Kain made a valiant effort to hold his own as his protector shook off what had to have been an ugly knock to the head.

Kain raised his free hand, intending to repeat his earlier prank and pull the creature away, however Raziel surprised him by beating him to the punch. Rising from where he had been flung with an angry cry, the knight threw himself onto the massive shoulders of the beast, sword forgotten as he dug in his claws. Once more fire bloomed from his fingers, this time less flashy than previously as the magical charge was directed down and into the stone beneath his furious grip. Black basalt heated to an angry red in moments under his concentrated attack.

Kain watched amazed. The strength of Raziel's magic slowly turning the monster to slag before his eyes. Enchantments weakening as its structure collapsed, the golem wheeled and feebly tried to shake off its doom. The vampire clung tightly to the softening stone however, pumping all his strength into maintaining the awe inspiring fire he had summoned. Warped beyond repair by the internal pressures of its overheated body, the beast finally exploded. Kain casually deflected one of a hundred burning-hot projectiles that erupted from the event. In the shadow of the cave to Raziel's other side, he could see his fledgling-self duck and shield his head with the flat of his axe blades as a similar shower was sent his direction.

Raziel's hands burned as bright-white as the Reaver's own fire as he fell to the floor, catching himself on hands and knees, his prey dissolved. Just as in the swamp, the unbelievable flames did their wielder no harm, seeming patently fake as they coursed up his arms. Only the fledgling's horrified cringing, and the ozone smell in the air, reminded him that both the heat, and the danger, were very real. Drawing a breath to focus himself for the effort, his lieutenant raised his hands to draw the flames inwards as before. His fire quenched itself as absolutely as if it had never been.

The room was bizarrely quiet in the aftermath. The distant rumble of the earth shifting yet again, the slap of water against stone as the subterranean lake absorbed the last of the debris, were the only things audible other than Raziel's labored breathing.

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His alter ego was the first to recover from the stasis the room seemed to be locked in. Pushing himself off the wall with a hiss of annoyance, the blond hooked his weapons back onto his belt and gingerly stepped closer to where Raziel sagged. Even armored, and sheltered from most of the fight, the fledgling had acquired a few scuffs and bruises. It almost made him look like he was actually a participant in their little endeavor, rather than just a bored spectator.

Kain spared a glance around their room, surprised that the false-god wasn't going to immediately respond to his defeat, but didn't dare take his eyes off his other-self for long. There was something avaricious in the young vampire's expression that he didn't like. His suspicion was compounded by the casual confidence with which the handsome fledgling reached out to caress the back of his lieutenant's head.

"Are you harmed in any way?" The fledgling crouched next to his future champion, voice smoothly compassionate for once. "That was a heavy blow you took."

"I- I am unhurt, I think." Raziel looked as surprised as Kain felt. Tattered, and dazed looking as he crouched on the scorched portion of cave-floor, the knight was almost grey with exhaustion, too tired to think that the kind sentiment offered was wholly out of character for the vampire in question. Raziel smiled hesitantly at the hand he was offered, accepting it and the fledgling's kindness as if the creature was entirely genuine. Kain felt himself tensing, waiting for the other shoe to drop as his alter-ego helped his lieutenant stand; the pale vampire tisking and making a show of concern over his scrapes and bruises. The infant blood-drinker was up to something, the question was what?

"So you truly are like me? A vampire?" Young Kain smiled again, even more warmly than before as he looked Raziel over, "I did not think that any of our cursed-race could be so beautiful. Yet here you are. I must confess. I am somewhat relieved. The only vampire's I've encountered thus far in life are Vorador, and this wreck of a creature here…" The boy gestured in his direction, expression eloquently dissatisfied. "Hardly a pair of promising views of the future. But wings? Wings could prove useful, I think."

Kain blinked, recognizing the alteration for what it was. A seduction? He resisted the sudden impulse to reach out and strangle his former-self. Of course the boy would be tempted by Raziel. He was still little better than a human of twenty-two, hot blooded and vainglorious. And Raziel, being Raziel, was as eye catching as ever, regardless of his battered appearance.

Had it been his own lieutenant standing besides the fledgling Kain, and not this new one, he had no doubt Raziel would have laughed in the vampire's face at such a blatant attempt to be charming. His Raziel however, was as much a jaded and cynical bastard as he was himself. But this wasn't his old lieutenant. What did his new child, from his wholesome and boring future, make of the fledgling's sudden change of mood? There was no way he could have learned to defend against such obvious flattery. Blinking with pleasure at being recognized, Raziel seemed to light up at the praise gifted by the creature so similar to his own master.

"Raziel." Kain was compelled to interrupt before the farce went too far. "What was it our aquatic troublemaker was spouting about earlier? I confess I wasn't paying attention."

His replacement-lieutenant looked at him as if remembering his presence for the first time. "My lord?"

"It spoke to you, did it not?" Kain deliberately didn't grind his teeth. An eons worth of patience brought to bear. Sensing his annoyance, the Reaver buzzed in his hand, awaiting its next chance to feed. Its aura was easily the brightest thing in the cavern. Their recent skirmish, and the golems' charging had stirred up dust enough to mute the already faint braziers. "Was there anything of use?"

"No… I don't think so." Raziel frowned, shifting slightly in response to the other Kain's continued presence at his shoulder. They made a very pretty pair. It was insufferable, really. The fledgling didn't help matters, raising a hand to support the tired vampire's shoulder when he wavered. "It spoke some insanity about how you were going to bring about the end of the world…"

"Same old song then." Kain snorted, darkly entertained. "And you, Kain? You seem remarkably congenial given that a moment ago you were promising to slaughter my companion and I both."

"You, I still plan to kill." The youth shrugged calmly. "But this one? This one I think perhaps I shall keep for myself. Sliding his gauntleted fingers over the knight's shoulder to ruffle his hair gently, the fledgling granted his companion another dazzling smile, looking like a prince of the blood rather than the useless jackass he had proven thus far. "He is far easier on the eyes than you, certainly, and not without some remarkable skills."

Resisting the urge to forcibly apply his palm to his forehead at the news, Kain sighed at the sight of Raziel's incredulous expression. The gullible idiot would undoubtedly fall for the youth's pretty speeches, he could hardly blame him. Here was a Kain that looked just like the one that had spurned him for his entire life, and yet spoke as a dear friend? The knight could hardly do otherwise than become enchanted. It would only make the inevitable betrayal all the more sickening. Kain had tortured his fair share of innocents in his heyday, but to see the pathetic little game played out in front of him now was simply too pathetic. After all he had put his replacement lieutenant through in the past two days; he could at least spare him the indignity of being played for a fool by a pretty face.

"You can't have him, Kain." He stated grimly, ignoring for the moment Raziel's mute confusion. "He doesn't belong here any more than I do. His very presence here is corrupting the time line."

"Oh? Is there another of him running around somewhere?" The fledgling raised a pale eyebrow, curious, "Or are we speaking in hypotheticals."

"I'm certain that if I put my case before the Oracle, it will find a way to unravel the means for me to keep him. Perhaps we will merely kill the other one. How can there be a paradox, after all, if there is only one of something left?"

"And what of the time line, and the Kain, he rightfully belongs to?" Kain folded his arms and glared at the youth. Kill the other one? It didn't bear thinking about, not when that other was none other than the Soul Reaver itself. It was sadly true that at this jointure the blade was far more valuable than the man, whatever his personal feelings to the contrary were. Raziel had know that, and so volunteered for the sacrifice. Yet another instance when the vampire's rare courage had shone through. He could sympathize with the youth's partiality for the man, but he could not allow it to change what was necessary. "You are robbing your future-self of his favored champion. Not to mention adding to the chaos currently consuming the world."

"Your riddles bore me, old one." The young vampire rolled his eyes. "All I am able to understand from your ranting is that you are opposed to me taking this one for my own. Why am I not surprised? Be content with your demon blade, which I must grudgingly confess is a marvel in its own right, and leave this beautiful creature to me."

"That isn't an option. And you know it." Kain felt the platform shiver as another micro quake jolted through the bedrock of the world. The others felt it too, crouching and glancing upwards in momentary distraction. He used the fledgling's instinctive fear to his advantage, pressing his point as bluntly as he could. There was no time to sugar coat things anymore.

"You say you want to save the world by killing me and restoring the Pillars? You'll end up killing him too. Both he and I are two out of the three of the currently irresolvable paradoxes that have crippled Nosgoth's way forward. The timeline is already strained to the breaking point due to Moebius' and your so-called Oracle's meddling. If the obstacles we represent aren't cleared away soon, all will truly be lost."

Raziel stared at his pronouncement mouth opening as if to protest, but he was cut off by the youth's faster tongue.

The blond hissed in annoyance. "Nonsense. If simply going back and forth in time was enough to cause the world to collapse, I'd have done it myself a week ago when I first used Moebius' time streaming device to kill William the Just."

Fixing him with a yellow eyed stare, the vampire deliberately turned and petted Raziel's hair again. The knight simply turned to stare at him as well, stunned mute by their self-righteous debate over the end of the world, or by the vampire's sudden affection, it was impossible to say. Clearly his alter-ego saw something that pleased him in Raziel's expression, for the blond resumed his gloating with a triumphant smirk. "I think you're bluffing to save your own leathery skin. The Oracle tells me that it is you alone, the false Balance, whose existence has left the world a confused and fractured place. Your death is all that is required to put us back on a proper course."

"Your trip through time was a minor detour compared to the difference between this age and mine, or his." Kain pointed to the knight, forcibly reminding his youthful self that as well-formed as the vampire was, he was at least a thousand years older than the young Kain likely suspected. "Our very existence in this stream is obstructive, implausible. We should not be here. It is only a matter of time before we must either return to our own futures, or be cast from history all together."

Kain pointed again, this time at the shattered chunks of mural at the youth's feet. "None of this was supposed to happen! This isn't part of either of our histories! You were meant to find the Soul Reaver at Avernus, ready and waiting for your final battle against the Moritanius and the Dark Entity within him! You were not fated to spend days on end lurking in a watery hole in the ground conversing with a burrowing nightmare like an idle school boy while it settles the future to its liking."

"Yes." The young vampire nudged a chunk of fresco-coated plaster with his foot. The torso sized bit of ruin depicted the left hand side of the vampire race's foretold-savior, from chin to chest, a hint of the Reaver's outline apparent at the crumbling edge. "There may indeed be something in what you say. Perhaps I have been too accommodating of my so-called-advisor."

Tapping his chin, young Kain looked around the general devastation of the room. Not even the cynical fledgling could see the shattered stumps of the Pillars and remain completely unmoved. Interestingly, there was not a peep from the water around them. Either the false-god was preoccupied with eavesdropping, or was plotting some new gambit that was time consuming in its preparation. Kain ground his teeth, awaiting the youth's pronouncement, feeling vital seconds slipping away. The longer they stayed in the catacomb, the more the danger. Or perhaps, the squid knew already that it didn't matter which Kain held the Reaver, having planned to come out on top either way? That was an unpleasant thought. The urge to escape was a pressing one.

"The Soul Reaver is destined to be mine, isn't it… I see now it was a mistake to refuse to take your blade earlier." The fledgling frowned, drawing his own conclusion. "Once in my possession, I will have nothing to fear from any foe. I could cut even you down without any effort at all, I wager. It is indeed a power befitting a Balance Guardian, regardless of its monstrously ugly hilt. Perhaps I can get it re-forged into something a little more… in keeping with my style."

Kain couldn't even begin to guess how the Reaver would feel upon hearing the news that its new master wished to make it over again on account of a fashion faux pas. The blade would probably scream fit to bring the roof down on them. Still, at least the vampire had finally recognized the weapon's power, cosmetics aside, it was a critical step in the right direction. Their little romp with the Elder God had proven useful after all.

His work was nearly complete. Kain couldn't help but feel a return of his tired hope from days before. Once his sword was in the proper Kain's hands, the youth would be purified and prepared for the future to come. Then there was simply the matter of tying off loose ends so that the Pillars, and Nosgoth itself would recognize their new master.

Two Kains was one too many, he had know that from the very moment he had lead Raziel on their merry chase back in the snowy wasteland that had become the Oracle' shrine. To attempt to undo the false history that had led to his dark empire, he had been willing to risk everything. He considered his life as a series of moves in an elaborate game. The pawns had been removed from the board early on. And one by one, the more valuable tools had fallen, necessary sacrifices in order to put his opponents in check. At this point there were very few moves left to make, and precious few pieces, on either side, to make them with.

He could try Moebius' infernal device one more time perhaps, and see what became of the future in the hopes of finding a time and place where he could rejoin the continuum without forcing a conflict. But even that might not solve the headache inducing paradox. What if he went forward two thousand years, only to discover that another Kain yet lived? Would he go another millennia further still, vainly hoping that he could resume his life interrupted? Or would his existence prove a paradox without end?

The false-god, and Ariel, had been correct, in their separate fashions. The easiest way out of their current world-ending gambit was for the guardian of the Pillar of Balance to sacrifice himself for the sake of the world. Not only would his blood serve just as well as the youth who stood across from him in restoring the broken monument, but it would finish Moebius' infernal meddling with causality once and for all. He was the last solitary link to the dark future that the time streamer had concocted, the result of his own youthful refusal to heed Ariel's command and fall on his sword.

Like his Raziel had been, so too was he a dead-end, an unfortunate artifact. His lieutenant had been destined to die, if for no other reason that the Reaver was meant to be eternal, not the man. So too was he himself destined to be consumed by the very sword he had carried for so many years, although not at all in the vengeful manner that Raziel had assumed. A Kain fed to the Reaver would readdress the tilted-scales of balance between them, as well as the balance of the world at large, he realized with a grim burst of humor. Just as he had taken his lieutenant's life, so long ago, it was only fitting, that this time, the roles would be reversed. How strange that two millennia ago he had stood at the Pillars and made his fateful choice, to live, and damn Nosgoth. Now here he was again, once more at the Pillars, once more with Nosgoth hanging in the balance. It almost felt like cheating, really.

It wasn't like he'd actually be entirely dead after all. The boy would still be here.

Two thousand years. Considering the entire span of his life, he was a little impressed at its length, especially considering the recent reminders of how ineptly it had started. It hadn't been all bad. There had been times, especially at the beginning of the empire; that he had particularly enjoyed. Even the last thousand years, mostly filled with waiting, and reminiscing, had held a certain aesthetic appeal. He had no regrets. What would he have possibly accomplished in another thousand years of life that he hadn't already?

Idly he wondered if in being devoured by the Reaver's wraith, if he would join with the soul already in the blade. As maudlin as the idea first seemed, it did have a strangely comforting sort of appeal. Undoubtedly the sword would be a trifle crowded with both of them elbowing each other for dominance, but how much more powerful would it be for its new wielder? Kain snorted in amusement at the idea of spending eternity harassing his younger-self much as Raziel's soul seemed to delight in badgering him now.

Resolved, he considered the other factors in his equation; Raziel and Janos.

His own lieutenant had clearly seen what had to be done, and had done it, without so much as a 'by your leave'. But the new one? Raziel with his smoky wings and thwarted history, what would become of him? If his soul was the same as the blade's how was it he existed at all in an uncorrupt future? Shouldn't the restored timeline have erased his human, and vampiric existence entirely? Or had one Raziel's sacrifice absolved all the myriad others… Somehow Kain didn't suppose he'd be so lucky.

Either way, there was a point in the future where a Raziel-shaped hole existed. His snatching the boy from his correct moment hadn't really changed the boy's destiny in the slightest. Perhaps Raziel's was a paradox that could only be resolved in the future. By dying, or merging with the terrible weapon his Kain had entombed, the knight would set the events of fate motion one way or another. He couldn't entirely see how the alternate future would unfold, but he felt in his bones that the boy needed to return to his proper place, whatever the result. The cruel necessity of it made his stomach twist. There was nothing that could be done, however. Kain was grimly glad that when that moment of painful truth came about, he wouldn't be there to see it. Having already sacrificed his own lieutenant twice already, he didn't have the heart to stand idly by and watch the vampire be cast away yet again.

He didn't have a heart at all! Even if he followed the advice he was soon to give his new lieutenant, and use the time streaming chamber to return to the future, in the hope of finding a Kain shaped hole. Likely he'd die anyway, as soon as he crossed the threshold.

He almost laughed at the dark comedy of his predicament. Not only was he an irritant in the timeline by existing, but thanks to his Raziel's caviler resurrection of Janos, he was still suffering the indignity of walking around without a heart of his own. Kain didn't suppose that such a thing ought to have been possible for any vampire, even the supposed Scion of Balance.

It wasn't his supremacy of power, merely the time stream's complete chaos, and perhaps the Reaver's magic, that had kept him on his feet after being robbed of the vital bit of muscle. Between Moebius' trickery, the elder god's schemes, Raziel's furious one-wraith-crusade for the truth, and his own ham-fisted compensations in the timeline, the whole idea of cause and effect was becoming more than a little theoretical. His continued existence was the result of a clerical error at the cosmic scale. Eventually the continuum would sort itself out or collapse under the strain of the logical inconsistencies. The first would lead to his inevitable collapse and likely dissolution. The second would mean the end of everything.

Kain rubbed his chest and grimaced. Another reason why the young one must live, and he must not. He, Raziel and Janos Audron all were dead-ends. The ancient at least wasn't a severe problem. In that sense the Hylden would be doing him and Nosgoth a singular service in a hundred years by removing the ancient vampire from the game permanently. The sooner all of them were swept from the board, the better for Nosgoth.

All this musing didn't change the fact that the youth was still standing in front of him, waiting for him to finish their spat. Knowing how it would all end was one thing. Getting the fledgling to cooperate in the here-and-now was another all together. Why the boy had to be so damnably stubborn, he didn't know. His youthful motivations were lost in the fog of ancient-history. Probably it was Nuraptor's madness, the blind paranoia and egomania it had inspired in him for the first several centuries of his life that made the youth so difficult to deal with.

After allowing the Reaver to cure that particular taint, he would have his chance to clarify the number of other misconceptions the boy possessed as well. There was still a chance, as slim as it was, to shape the fledgling into the kernel of the man he was required to become.

He shifted his grip on the blade, allowing its hilt to balance lightly against his outstretched fingers as it balanced on its tip. The Soul Reaver shimmered like a firefly in the muted light, seeming to understand his intention. A small degree of entreaty might go further with the now agreeably inclined youth than a highhanded command. "If you truly mean to take up this sword, you'd better do it now. Until it is in your hands, the future is… unpredictable at best."

"Just like that? You're going to just give it to me? Even though I mean to kill you with it?" Young Kain glanced around the dark cavern, as if expecting a protest from his unseen councilor. "You're supposed to fight me tooth and nail for it."

"Let's just say, my motivations are a little obscure." He agreed calmly. "I told you back in Nachtholm that my ending was foretold. It is your ending I am trying to circumvent, Kain." The handsome fledgling raised an eyebrow at his remark, but leapt over the narrow channel of water separating them. Standing toe to toe with his own history, he found he wasn't entirely displeased by the curious, searching stare the youth granted him. Young Kain might be the dupe of the Oracle, at the moment, but with some careful handling, that would soon be corrected.

Getting something for nothing was clearly a sore point with the young vampire. Kain smirked as he watched his former self study first him, and then his blade, as if seeking the hidden trap. "There is no trick, Kain." He stated for the record. "But if you would feel more comfortable, I will more than happily demand something of you, in trade for the fight we ought to be having. There is one thing I will ask you to do for me before eviscerating me with my own sword."

Drawing a step closer, the youth matched his stare, amused. "Name it."

"Look into the lake, while holding the weapon in your hands, and tell me what it is that you see at the bottom." Kain smiled grimly.

"That is all you want?" The fledgling smirked, incredulous.

Strange to realize, that they had the same cynical smile despite the gulf of centuries between them. The pretty face, he had only faint memories of wearing. But the sharp twist of lips? That was familiar. For the first time since finding the boy, Kain felt a momentary kinship. When not being an ass, the young vampire's vast potential was plain. No wonder Vorador had put up with him all those years ago despite his waspish temper.

"That is enough." Kain nodded. "If you look, and can honestly say you are untroubled by what you see? Then I will accept that your precious Oracle was right all along, and my efforts in trying to keep you safe have been a pointless exercise."

"What is down there?" The blond youth turned to consider the lake around their platform, curious for the first time.

"The truth."

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Somehow he expected letting go of the Reaver to be more of a struggle. Holding fast to it against all comers but Raziel over the long centuries had gone beyond mere habit, almost as instinctive as breathing. His shoulders and hands felt strange, already missing the weight they had borne for the better part of two thousand years.

Transferred as it was, from Kain, to Kain, the sword's aura had barely the time to flicker. Kain grinned, watching how the blade's flames were still twined up and over the youth's shoulder, likely paralyzing the boy entirely as the sword finished its work. Surrendering his weapon might have been anticlimactic for him but the fledgling's expression had hinted that the new connections being made were anything but passive.

For Kain, the momentary burst of balancing energy the Soul Reaver had inflicted on him had felt more like an internal epiphany than any sort of external assault on the senses. He supposed that he didn't really require much in the way of a kick to the pants, after a few thousand years of self-correction against his original madness. Ennui had done most of the Reaver's work for it long ago. Not so with the youthful Kain now ensnared in the soul sword's magic. The boy was wide-eyed and trembling as the blade made the necessary alterations to his body and mind, undoing Nuraptor's damage without further delay.

"My god." The pale haired fledgling spoke at last, voice rough with wonder. "The Oracle never said anything about it being alive."

"It speaks?" Kain felt a momentary twist of bitter jealousy at the thought. With the correct Kain at hand, would the sword be granted further latitude? The petty unfairness of it was galling.

The youth shook his head slowly, still dazed. "No, but it feels." Turning this way and that, the vampire didn't notice Kain's silent sigh of relief and subsequent guilt. "It seems to impart to me, that I should trust you, fiend. It is curiously fond of you for some reason."

"The blade and I have spent considerable time together over the years." Kain replied, already regretting have let it go. Petty it might be, but he missed the Reaver's presence at his fingertips. The loss of the sword's aura after several days of its elusive back-chat left him feeling restless, lonely.

"Everything looks the same… and yet, it isn't. Is it?" The boy hardly heard his reply. The Reaver could heal ailments of the body and mind, but the only cure to being a self-serving wretch of twenty-two that he knew of, was time. Still staring at everything with calculating fascination, the vampire was oblivious to his critique. Even the ruined portions of mural scattered across the floor were worthy of inspection by the young hothead as he enjoyed his newly enhanced senses.

"You'll find you adapt pretty quickly." Kain shrugged, tiredly entertained by his younger-self's antics. "It's only really jarring when you realize something you've taken for granted has been an illusion all along. They'll appear shadowlike, insubstantial. Also your ability to see magical phenomena will be vastly improved."

"The Pillars!" The youth turned again, staring upwards at the broken lengths of column hanging from the ceiling. "They're still glowing! Barely."

"Yes." It hadn't occurred to him that they didn't shine for someone unable to see clearly. Kain frowned, wondering how many other things he had been taking for granted. Raziel finally crossed the watery divide and joined them on the platform, apparently deciding it was safer now that they had stopped squabbling. Kain wondered grimly with which copy of himself would the lieutenant stand, now that he had the ability to choose.

To his surprise and pleasure the knight crossed to stand at his shoulder, watching the other Kain with a look of concern. "You're mended?" Kain asked idly, also observing the fledgling as the boy first hefted the blade, surprised at its easy weight, and then took it in both hands and studied the skull on the hilt minutely. Would the fledgling make the connection between sword and man? Probably not for a few hundred years yet. He knew Raziel to see him, but nothing of his personality. Unless the sword told him outright, he would remain in ignorance until he started meddling with Moebius' time devices, or, his so-called Oracle spilled the dirty secret.

He was distracted from his musings by a gentle hand on his shoulder. Kain turned, surprised by the gesture. Raziel was giving him the same worried sort of look he had moments ago given the fledgling, golden eyes making a thorough inspection of his face and chest. "I am fine. It is you that I am concerned about." Glancing over momentarily, the knight fluffed his feathers before pinning Kain again with his searching stare. "Are you certain you want to do this? Give him the sword?"

"The future isn't carved in stone, child, especially now." Kain mused softly, not wanting to distract the young vampire on the other side of their platform from his initial joy at owning the sentient blade. What was Raziel's soul communicating to the youth, he wondered? It was just like standing on the opposite side of a pane of glass from a critically interesting piece of conversation. Knowing that he would never be a part of that exclusive form of communion again, he forced the last of his jealousy aside.

Raziel seemed to sense his unease, for the knight's hand tightened briefly on his shoulder, sympathetic to his distraction. Kain shook his head. "I think that between the Soul Reaver and myself, we can convince the youth to not be quite so negligent going forwards. With any luck, the future you return to will be a trifle different from the one you remember presently."

"You mean that when I return, my Kain…"

"Will be a little more- as he should have been." He watched the youth with a pang of reminiscence. Seeing for the first time from an outsider's perspective, his own youthful persona, completed. The boy looked the part, at least. Between his autocratic profile, his knightly trappings, and the obviously magical totem he wielded, he had a convincing aura about him. Champion of the Pillars? Savior of Nosgoth? King of the world? Kain didn't suppose the boy would have too hard a fight ahead of him. Compared to the odds stacked against himself, should he try such a maneuver in his current form? Yes, the boy had a very good chance of making himself heard. There was more than enough charisma about him to sway the mobs into following him. The Soul Reaver would ensure that anyone who sought to test his claims would learn to regret it.

"I don't like this. I don't trust him, Kain." Raziel's repressive whisper made him pause, surprised again. Turning to consider the vampire standing next to him, face plainly devoid of any of pleasure or awe exhibited earlier, Kain blinked realizing that he too had been duped into thinking the knight charmed by the fledgling's pretty face. All his earlier wide-eyed innocence had been a ploy? A trap for a hunter? The templar was cleverer than he looked

"You were flattering Kain deliberately?" Kain mused, staring thoughtfully at his lieutenant. The knight turned to him, surprised by the mild accusation. "You knew his charisma was false."

Raziel winced and nodded, looking chagrined. "You forget, Kain." Raziel rubbed his head, "I have served one very much like him for- far too many years. I have seen him use many such tricks. And have fallen for my fair share of them."

"I am sorry, for that." He surprised himself with the apology, finding suddenly that he couldn't meet the vampire's eyes. Kain watched his fledgling self instead, mentally categorizing the list of advice he wanted to give as opposed to the list the youth was most likely to heed.

It was strange to seek forgiveness for a life he had no memory of. Kain conceded that he had more than enough to grovel for in the memories he did possess. Still, the very pettiness of the abuse the vampire must have put up with over the years was galling. Raziel had undoubtedly deserved far better than he had been given. He was owed an apology by someone, and as it was unlikely his own Kain would think of it, the deed fell to him instead. Bereft of the Soul Reaver, and soon of his own life, it wasn't as though he had anything to lose from the humbling gesture.

His sometime-ally pulled his shoulder gently, obliging him to look at him once again. Kain felt the measuring weight of his stare for a moment before Raziel's face relaxed into a winsome sort of smile. "You have nothing to apologize for, Scion. You are as different from the lord that raised me as night is to day. I don't think I could express to you, how very glad- I mean to say, it- has been an honor to know you, even these scarce hours. It has been an honor to serve you. This, coming here, is one of very few things in my life I find I do not regret."

"You haven't known me nearly long enough." Kain sighed. "Your lord and I are not so different. Both of us pawns of circumstance. Had you known me as my Raziel did, I don't think you'd be nearly so forgiving."

"Perhaps." The knight looked around their dismal prison, and back at the softly glowing Reaver blade. "But even so, I think, I'd regret leaving you."

"Necessity is a cruel mistress. As is Balance." Kain smirked. "Moebius and I both have bent the rules on any number of occasions. But even in doing so, we knew. Bending them, doesn't make them go away. Eventually debts must be paid, balances readdressed, even for Guardians and Emperors. Or the world might truly collapse."

"And false gods?"

"Even they must find themselves weighted and measured." Kain agreed darkly. "And that day will no doubt be soon."

Raziel let his hand fall away, glancing over at the ribbon of shadowy water surrounding their stage. "It has been oddly quiet, since you defeated its creatures. It was plenty talkative until now."

"Waiting no doubt." He sighed.

"For your death?" The templar frowned again, turning back to him with renewed stubbornness.

"Most likely."

"I can't believe you're willing to allow this." Raziel's wings shuffled in response to his anxiety, "To just stand there and let that- that boy destroy you? There has to be some other way."

"And yet, I tell you, it is all as it should be." Kain clasped a hand around the back of the fussing vampire's neck, holding him firm until his temper steadied. "You will be returned to your future, I will do what must be done here. All will be well. You will see."

"Will I remember?" The templar looked at the gravel strewn sigils etched into the platform and them up at him, haunted. "When I go back will I remember any of this?"

"Your memories will reflect the changes wrought in the timeline, it is true." Kain shrugged. "It is possible that some phantom memories of your life-thus far will linger a while, but they shouldn't cause you any confusion."

"I do not think I should like it, if I forgot you." Raziel confessed softly, looking up to study his face again. To that, Kain found he had no worthy response. To say he hadn't intended to foster either the knight's regard, or cause him pain by compelling him to go, would have sounded banal. Telling the boy that he'd be far happier with his new and improved lord, on returning home was mere wishful thinking at this point. He had no idea as yet, whether any changes he could affect in the here-and-now would ripple far enough to matter to the knight.

"Listen to the pair of you. You gabber like a pair of bad actors in a ten-penny romance." Young Kain, it seemed had concluded his initial self-congratulations on obtaining the Soul Reaver. Curious about the remaining occupants in the room once more, the fledgling was watching them with a look of bored disgust. "I almost hate to ask, but which of you is supposed to be the girl?"

Kain let his hand fall away from Raziel's neck as the vampire straightened, furious. Glancing at the ceiling and the sky beyond, Kain wondered what conspiracy of fate had let him forget what a snide bastard he had once been. The youth was oblivious, preferring to glare at his lieutenant in cynical amusement.

"I pray to god that it is you. At least you're pretty enough that it wouldn't be entirely appalling. For sake of my spleen though, at least have the decency to play at blushing-maiden to someone less horrible! Seeing you make cow eyes at an old monster like him is sickening." The blond vampire made a face.

"At least he is only monstrous on the outside." Raziel hissed, staring angrily at the vampire, feathers ruffling visibly with his ire.

"Tch. I dislike zealots." The fledgling glared at Kain instead. "And you! You're a properly bent penny, aren't you? Your appetites are as twisted as the rest of you."

"No more so than yours." He pointed out their shared tendency for liking-as-like, enjoying the youth's flinch immensely. It would be years yet, he remembered, before the tedious quasi-religious morals beaten into him as a human would be fully shaken off. The boy actually managed to look offended at the implication that he was not entirely skirt-mad. Still, it wouldn't do to antagonize the creature. "Have you looked yet?" He opted to change the topic instead.

"Not as yet." The youth's eyes narrowed, recognizing the evasion for what it was. Watching them both a long moment, the vampire seemed to weigh his desire for the argument against his need to complete the current chore. "Is there someplace in particular you'd prefer I look? Or am I to make my own assessment."

"As you please, Kain." He gestured to the water. "All sides are as good. Look, and see if you have a question for me."

The vampire shrugged, choosing the side furthest from them to conduct his investigation. Peering downwards for a long moment he frowned and shuffled further to the left, repeating his glance. Crouching between the ruined Pillars he rested the Soul Reaver across his knees and once more studied the depths beneath the water. Kain couldn't blame the boy for wanting to get a good long look at beast below. No doubt the shock of what Raziel's soul might reveal would prove most illuminating.

Other than the fledgling's shuffling, and the ever present sounds of dripping water, the cavern was entirely quiet. A pleasant change from the bellowing and stomping of the elder-god's nasty little herd of statuary. With everything was peaceful and shadowy in the underground shrine, he was surprised how comfortable it felt, even with the water so close at hand. Perhaps it was the proximity to the Pillars he found soothing. Even without the Reaver's help Kain was able to make out the faint hum of energy coming off the ruined columns. Defeated they might be, but not yet entirely destroyed. He had built his throne room around them for a reason. Even in their permanently decayed state, they had been comforting to him, a place where he inevitably belonged.

The Hylden were no doubt taking full advantage of the broken barriers between dimensions. The youngster would have to be warned to step carefully should he venture near Meridian. Kain let the worries flow past him for a peaceful moment, turning to find Raziel watching him once again, brow furrowed slightly as he wrestled with his own thoughts. Several of the magical braziers had fallen with the false-god's attacks, leaving them standing in half light at best.

Of the three of them, Raziel seemed the most out of place in the comfortable darkness. His wings looked dusty and disarrayed from being banged into the walls and floor so often in the past half hour. The knight's face had a pinched, tense look about it. His posture oddly defensive as he stood a little to Kain's right, and at an angle. Ready to shield him from the world at large if it was asked? Kain reached out again, cupping the back of the vampire's neck to distract him from his pointless worries, ruffling the short hair at his nape in gentle encouragement. It was hard to recognize in the bruised and bedraggled knight the timid creature of a few days prior. If nothing else, his time in this reality had taught the templar to stop slouching. He was rather proud of the vampire's progress, unexpected at it had been.

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"There's nothing there." The young vampire concluded calmly. Hooking his hand into a crack running down the side of the broken Pillar of Conflict, the handsome blond leaned as far out over the water as he dared, gazing straight into the murky depths. "This sword is truly a marvel, Kain, for I can see quite clearly all the way to the bottom. Did you know the Pillars descended into the bedrock? How deep do they go, do you suppose?"

"Nothing?!" Kain blinked, shocked. All serenity was forgotten at the unpleasant announcement. "There can't be nothing. The beast was right there but a moment ago."

"I know nothing of your 'beast', old one." His alter-ego frowned, craning his neck to get a better look. "I see some ancient carvings, the broken shafts of the Pillars, and some underwater cavern portals. Not particularly appalling scenery, save the water itself. What was it you sought to sway me with?"

"A thousand-ton monstrosity lurking just beneath the surface?" Kain asked himself the obvious question, peering over the edge with considerably more caution than previously. Without the Reaver's helpful aura, he could feel the moisture on his claws like an itch. Dipping a toe in would be painful.

The empty hollow beneath their tenuously suspended stage was indeed vacant. Every last knotted tentacle and sulfurous eyeball was absent, leaving only a series of guilty-looking grooves in the lakebed. The unspeakable squid had somehow managed to toddle off? It was unthinkable. He had underestimated the beast's tenacity. "I'll be damned." Kain almost had to laugh at the absurdity of his adversary's tactic. "That's why the bastard was so quiet, it knew with the Reaver, you'd be able to see."

"See what?" The youth gave up scanning the water in favor of glaring at him instead. "All I see is a madman who expects bogymen to leap out of every shadow." The Soul Reaver's blue nimbus cast weird shadows over his face as he rose and crossed to the center of the platform.

"I was intending to show you the truth of your precious Oracle's nature." Kain shook his head, feeling a fool for being defeated in such an utterly mundane fashion. It hadn't occurred to him that the damned monster could manage a retreat. No doubt it was lurking in one of the watery passageways, or all of them, waiting the moment when their backs were turned. Such a stupidly successful ruse, and yet it had worked! He had squandered his chance to make the youth believe him. Sane the boy might now be, but he wouldn't appreciate being made a fool of.

At least Raziel could corroborate his weak story, for all the good it would do. The winged vampire had moved as well, jarred into action much as Kain had been. Crouched a few feet further along the platform's edge, the templar peered into the rippling surface of the lake. "It's completely gone, Kain." The knight stared up at him, mystified. "Where has it fled to?"

"I don't know." He pushed himself to his feet, looking around the crumbling chamber. The false god had seemingly abandoned them. Good in a sense, since it meant he could concentrate on a means of escaping their little tomb, but most unfortunate, just the same. If he could not produce proofs enough to satisfy the young vampire soon, the boy would claim his head before he could warn him of any of the other dangers in store. "What good is it to have the ability to recognize the unseen, if the unseen runs away." He grumbled to himself as he considered their resources. The only way out was exactly as it had been before, buried beneath a half ton of carved stone.

"I have no idea what the pair of you are babbling about, but really, I think I've been more than patient." The fledgling rested his blade's point against the platform as a new quake shook them all. Whether the beast was on the move, or Nosgoth was crumbling further, was impossible to guess.

"I have looked, Kain. And I am not impressed." His alter ego sighed. "I trust you are satisfied that I have held up my end of the bargain?"

With no option left but to try and stall the youth for time. Kain hissed his fury at the lake before matching the vampire's bored look. "I am not satisfied, but I cannot hold you accountable. The thing I wished to show you is no longer here."

"That isn't my problem." The fledgling waived his free hand dismissively. "Come. The quakes grow worse. We must finish this nonsense and restore the Pillars before we are obliged to swim in order to do so."

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	7. Chapter 7

**Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King**

(A continuation fan-fiction for Legacy of Kain: Defiance)

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My computer died after 8 years of long service, but I was able to (eventually) salvage the drafts for ch 7 and 8. Sorry for the delay! Thanks to all who have reviewed! Please bear with the typos, I have a hunch I'll be adding minor tweaks to this chapter as my wits allow later this week. Our lovely web-archive's uploader program seems to be stripping all the underscores out of my text whether I want it to or not.

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/../- implies vampiric 'whisper' a.k.a. telepathy/mental projection.

The Soul Reaver isn't capable of speech as such, but I gave it dialog anyway to show that Kain can interpret its wordless snark without difficulty? I have no idea. Just go with it.

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**The End: Chapter 7-**

Kain stood his ground as the youth swung the Soul Reaver experimentally against the dank air. The afterimage of its flaming aura followed the blade's arc like a ghostly fan. He'd felt the Reaver's bite before now, as a wraith blade. His sword and Raziel's spectral version had tangled at Avernus Cathedral when Raziel had sought his heart for the sake of Janos Audron. He wasn't thrilled by the idea of throwing himself under the blade's edge again, even knowing he had to. Holding his hands away from his body, he reminded the vampire-he-used-to-be that he was unarmed.

"Allow me but a moment of your attention, child, and I would tell you of your future."

"I know my future, Kain. Do not imagine you can educate me further on the subject." The blond vampire dismissed his offer with a jerk of his chin, eyes narrowing as he raised his sword to the ready once more. "Stop delaying the inevitable and die already. Die so that the world might live."

"Only promise me that you will covet the Soul Reaver in my place. To be its master is to give it the respect it deserves." Kain addressed the first and foremost amongst his concerns. He could feel Raziel shifting at his side, the knight solidly determined to stand with him; ready despite the impossibility of mustering any worthwhile defense against the soul stealing blade. Reaching out without looking, he caught the vampire's arm, holding him back from anything foolish. Focused entirely on the dazzling blade in the darkness and its wielder, Kain tried to persuade the youth onto a different course. "The weapon is your birth-right. It is also your only means of salvation. You must keep it from those that would seek to diminish its power."

"The blade is cursed, sentient or not. I have no doubt of its power, but calling it my salvation? Surely you jest." The young vampire laughed cynically. "Other than using it to butcher you, I have no need of it to ensure either my own, or the world's salvation. You forget. I heard you declare this blade was marked as your doom! Did you think I would not make the connection? If it is your doom, it is more than likely mine as well."

The fledgling examined the flame wreathed sword in his hand, un-swayed by its cruel beauty. "Do you think I shall happily carry it around for the next thousand years so that it may turn me into a wrinkled old troll like you? Or so that any fool has only to pick it up when my back is turned and slay me with it? I think not." The blonde vampire stepped forwards, gathering himself for the task he was about to do. "I shall take very good care of it, never fear. But I shall never let it be used against me."

"Would you kindly stop making the mistake that the world revolves around you, Kain?" Kain shifted even as his adversary did, circling to his right to delay their final conflict. If the boy was inclined to debate with him, there was still chance of garnering his interest in the greater scheme of things. In theory, he had nothing to fear from the fledgling's efforts. While no mean swordsman, the youth had proven already to be no particular challenge. Kain was faster, stronger, more cunning than any vampire alive, he knew. But did any of that count against the Soul Reaver's magic? Or the stubbornness of a closed mind?

"Your eventual death is entirely superficial compared to the Reaver's true purpose." He spoke bluntly, hoping to shock the fledgling into greater curiosity regarding his destiny. "It is imperative that you keep it with you, always. Without it, your so-called-oracle will keep you chained with lies and enslaved by illusions for the rest of your unnatural life!"

They circled around the edges of the platform, ignoring tremors, water, and debris from the earlier battle. Kain eyed the youth across from him warily, reading his initiative from the set of his jaw, the tension in his arms. Undoubtedly the fledgling was doing as much for him as well. He was vaguely amused to see that the youth paid Raziel no mind, even as the younger Kain passed in front of the knight to continue his slow chase. The winged vampire was treated like just so much statuary, utterly dismissed in the vampire's absolute focus on larger prey.

Raziel blinked and stepped out of the way, raising an inquisitive eyebrow at Kain from over the youth's shoulders. How easy it would be, he realized, for the knight to simply knock the idiot down and pin him. For a moment he was tempted to let the vampire try it, Raziel certainly seemed willing enough to give it a go. The risk was simply too great however. If for some unknown reason, the man failed, the logical repercussion would be his youthful-self skewering Raziel on the Reaver's tip. That was an event Kain was earnestly trying to avoid. Sending the vampire away entirely would have been ideal, but he doubted the knight would listen.

Kain shook his head in negation, not wanting his lieutenant to provoke the boy to anything violent. He concentrated instead on his words, trying to explain to the young fool the magnitude of his mistake.

"The blade you hold in your hands was forged by the vampires of old in response to a threat not even they fully comprehended." He gestured at the broken murals all around them, wishing the false-god hadn't done quite such a thorough job of smashing them to pieces. They had told of the vampire's champion, sword in hand, perhaps it would have swayed the youth slightly to know his blade was more accurately foretold than he himself? Certainly he was neither winged, nor horned, nor blue, but he was still Scion. The Soul Reaver had, and would always be, the same. His alternate-self raised an eyebrow at his declaration, not entirely as disinterested as he claimed to be.

Kain forged ahead, wondering if he was getting through at all. "They created it as a tool to be used against the ultimate evil of their world, the true enemy of Nosgoth as yet unrevealed. It is a weapon forged from star-metal, enchantment, and the willingly-given soul of one of the best and most resolute of their tribe. They spared no effort, ensuring that the world's champion could be armed as none other in history ever had been. Has it ever occurred to you, Kain? That the Scion of Balance exists for no other reason than to see that the Soul Reaver is delivered to its final battle?"

"The battle is over, you old fool!" The fledgling gestured at the ruined shrine all around them in turn, utterly failing to see the point. As if on cue, the walls shuddered with a gentle tremor along with the earth itself. The unseen land beyond their little catacomb was still tearing itself apart, slowly but surely. "The world is on the brink now and you talk of future calamity? Open your eyes!"

"It is not my eyes that are blind!" Kain snarled back. "Such superficial damage as has been inflicted these past few days can be repaired! There are deeper issues at stake. Your 'oracle' seeks nothing but an endless repetition of the war and misery that has plagued Nosgoth since the beginning of recorded history! And you are playing right into its hands with your dreams of selfish conquest. Has it even mentioned the Hylden to you? What befell them? Their anticipated return?"

The youth blinked at him, confused, eyebrows drawing together artistically as he considered the question. "I know of no Hylden. What madness are you speaking of now?"

"God save me from your ignorance." Kain spat, furious with himself. This was not how he had planned their tête-à-tête at all. Perhaps a mutual enemy would provide the necessary impetus for the youth to collaborate with him a while longer. There was precious little else in the ruined shrine to distract the boy from his self-declared quest. "Make no mistake, child. The Hylden are coming. Their hatred of all things vampiric is only shadowed by their hatred of this so-called-oracle the vampires once worshiped. They will not hesitate to throw everything they have at you, in this dimension and all others under their control. Once they kill you and claim the Soul Reaver, they will pervert the future to their own ends. The world will become little more than a playground for demons of every foul shape and size imaginable."

"I'll just have to make sure I don't lose then, shan't I." The blond vampire drawled, kicking some debris off the edge of the platform with a scuff of his boot. The room shuddered yet again, further filth dusting down from the cracked ceiling to coat the boy's armor, and the rest of them in a dusty film. Kain resisted the urge to sneeze, knowing how little it would take to provoke the young vampire into an attack. The youth shook his head, casting his mane of pale hair over his shoulder. "Thank you for the warning, Kain, but I probably would have figured it out on my own. Any other redundant bits of advice you want to inflict on me before I kill you?"

"This one." Kain gestured obliquely at Raziel, still standing in the shadows. "He must be returned to his proper time." His youthful self followed his hint and seemed surprised to see the knight still there. From prize-to-be-claimed to afterthought, Kain shook his head on the templar's behalf, how quickly the impatient fledgling dismissed anything, or anyone, that didn't prove immediately useful! More the fool him. Raziel at least seemed neither surprised nor offended. The winged vampire watched them both with narrowed eyes, lips pressed into a thin line as he bided his time, awaiting orders.

At his pronouncement however, the knight's expression twisted into an expressive grimace. Raziel glared at him from across the dimly lit platform. "You still insist on this insanity? Do I have no say at all?"

"None." Kain snapped at his suddenly stubborn ally.

"Don't be stupid." The fledgling agreed, sweeping his sword to the side in a regal gesture. "You are exactly as the fiend names you, a paradox, and a fool as well. You'd side with him even as he fulfills his prophesized role and brings about the end of the world?" The youth rolled his eyes as Raziel sputtered chided from both sides. Kain felt a momentary regret for snapping at his earnest companion but was caught by his alter ego's stare when he opened his mouth to counter the declaration. The armor-clad nobleman raised the Reaver, pointing at him with the blade's tip. "Is Moebius' little contraption at the heart of the Saraphan Sanctuary still intact? If not 'tis no matter, the Oracle has the ability to pull objects through time and space."

"Humor me, and use the time streaming chamber." Kain grimly replied. "You know something of its workings already, but you'll find the machine primed and ready for the necessary trip." The sanctuary was far enough south that the storms ought to have given the old fortress a miss as they'd carved up the highlands. Even if the place was a wreck, the time streaming device was at the lowest level of the structure and more than able to weather a little rain and wind. It was far better to embark on another round of digging through slush, than to blithely ask Raziel's former tormentor to escort a new version of him through the twisting passageways of time. Allowing the Elder God to play host on a journey back to the future stuck him as a terribly bad idea. Knowing the monster's sense of humor, there was no telling where or when the knight would end up.

"Well well, you seem to have thought of everything." The vampire's false cheer was positively grating. Kain resisted the urge to belt the child in the face for his insolence one last time.

"If your patience would allow it, I should like to see him departed in safety before doing you the favor of dying?" Kain didn't give his request very high odds, even as he asked. True to form, the vampire across from him smiled cynically, looking more fox-faced than ever with the bitter expression.

"You should have included that in your preliminary negotiations, old one. You were the one who set the terms so cheaply. You have no one to blame but yourself. He should be honored really." The pale haired vampire raised a gauntlet to solicit that Raziel step to the side and await his turn. "He will be able to witness my first formal act as Balance Guardian before I send him home."

"Your first failure, you mean." Raziel murmured angrily, claws clenching reflexively around the hilt of his own weapon. "You're no better than the one I left behind, blade or not."

"Bite your tongue, bird-man." The fledgling hissed, his false-gentility of minutes before completely forgotten. "It's bad enough that I have this supposed-future Kain to harass me, but an upstart winged freak too unimportant to be named in the prophesy seeks to school me as well? I think not." The youth left off stalking his chosen prey in favor of a target more appealing. His armor clattered authoritatively as he stalked across the dusty platform to stare Raziel in the eye.

The knight stood as if rooted even with the Reaver close enough to cut him. Young Kain sneered as his lack of reaction, "What do you know of me? Nothing. What are you to me? Nothing. I could pluck you bare with a word. I could cut you down at the same time as your wrinkled master here with barely a flicker more effort. History will forget you, Raziel. I will forget you. You would cease to exist forever, here and now." The youth snapped his fingers to emphasize his point. "And no one would ever know, or care, save your monstrous master over there. Do not seek to test my mercy, vampire. Others have done so to their peril."

Raziel matched the youth's look with one of autocratic distain. Seeming to forget the dim and dusty tomb, the rags he wore, and his own cringing past, the vampire stood unmoved by the threat. Tall, proud, and grimfaced, he suddenly seemed larger than life, magnificent, powerful, as if it was he who was destined to be emperor, not the boy. "And yet I say you are nothing. You speak of being remembered by history, but don't care what it is they will say of you? Kain the sycophant. Kain the butcher. Kain the easily beguiled. Is that what you want to be remembered for, Balance Guardian? You are strong, but have no interest in exerting your powers to their intended purpose. You have cunning, but willfully cling to your own ignorance."

Drawing himself up taller still, Raziel left the younger vampire standing slack jawed, delivering his verbal assault with a voice that had once – and still could – inspired armies. Even from the perspective of audience to the uncanny verbal flaying, Kain had to cringe at the accurate, if not at all friendly portrayal of his life. Much of what the vampire said was not entirely off-mark for his own history. That he had managed a little better in his own distant past, than the Kain that his Raziel remembered, counted for something. But he didn't delude himself that he had ever been a paragon of virtue. "The world looks to you for guidance, Kain. Raziel continued after a gut-wrenching pause, "Leadership, sacrifice, nobility of spirit. And what will you give? Your meat is selfish distain and disinterestedness. Your drink is casual sadism. You will revel in pomp and praise, and banners on city walls, never looking to the suffering beyond the surface. You demand your right to sup from golden cups, but you will never deign to work to earn it. 'All Hail Kain' by all means! Never you mind the weeping of the widows and orphans you leave in your wake."

"You- You - Do not talk to me of earning! I have done all! I have sacrificed! My humanity! My pride! I have toiled under the yoke of this prophecy thrust upon me when by all rights I should be dead, peacefully resting in my crypt. You dare call me lax?" The fledgling bared his teeth, pushed to the limit of his temper. "I have done exactly as I was meant to do! All save one thing! And that, I would not give! I will not give! My life is my own!" The Reaver flared with Kain's unbridled fury.

"Raziel." Kain barked at the knight, trying to remind him of their purpose. "Now is not the time!" The vampire had as much of a knack for riling the child's temper as ever his Raziel had done to provoke his own over the years. It didn't bode well. Swords drawn and words flying hot and free between the pair, it was only a matter of time before someone's control gave way. Seeing that neither was paying him any attention, he closed the distance between them anticipating that if the youth didn't make the first move, Raziel undoubtedly would. Fighting between them had already wasted precious time.

"You are a pretender. A conceited child playing at being a hero." Raziel stared the younger vampire down, ignoring Kain's council. His aura radiated disgust, but his voice was resonant, giving his insults an almost poetic feel. "If not for the soul sword? You'd be just another arrogant ankle-biter. You are wholly ignorant of your place in the world, your purpose, your very origins! You're unworthy of even polishing the armor of a creature like him." The templar's smile was barbed as he gestured at Kain's approach, clearly enjoying being able to sink the better part of a millennium's worth of frustration and bitterness into the ready target presented.

Kain reached the knight in time to grab Raziel's arms before the vampire could do something as stupid as strike at the youth. Raziel hissed at him in distracted fury, shouting his final declaration at Kain's alter ego before he was brought to heel. Kain dragged him back several feet, determined to smack his head into the wall to shut him up if he didn't hold his tongue. "I'm surprised it doesn't renounce you outright! Alive as it seems to be, it must recognize you as I do! As a petty, vain-glorious fool who has no more interest in saving Nosgoth than his own hide! You're a squire who loves the tourney, but fears the fight."

"That's enough, Raziel." Kain was forced to let go or do the vampire harm as the knight flipped his wings forcefully and fanned them slightly as if prepared to fly. Or fight, Kain realized. He had seen how hard the muscled appendages had knocked the Hylden back. The armored youth would weigh considerably more then those sorry corpses had, but undoubtedly it would still be a distracting attack. He stepped out of the way of one of the smoky grey wings as it threatened to do as much for him, and got a firm hold of Raziel's neck before he could slip away completely. "Do not confuse what might-be with what has not yet occurred."

"Believe me, lord Scion, I'm not." The vampire did not take his eyes off the pale fledgling across from him. The youth's unnaturally pale skin was flushed pink with rage. Raziel's own features were near bloodless with the same strong emotion, eyes baleful as they reflected the Reaver's fire back at its master.

"You call him Scion?!" Young Kain hissed, incredulous. "I am Balance. Not he. I possess the Soul Reaver-"

"Not for long. You're too scared to even hold it properly." Raziel bared his teeth, finger-claws fighting Kain's hold even as he was pulled further from his prey. "I wager even a child could take it from you."

"Your pet's tongue is going to get him into trouble someday, Kain." The fledgling announced grimly, lifting the Reaver blade into an over arm attack stance, holding the sword level with the ground as he seethed. "Perhaps I'll cut it out. And save you worrying about him."

"That would be unwise, Kain." Kain counseled, squeezing Raziel's throat tighter to prevent the vampire either twisting out of his grasp, or saying anything else liable to start a war. The knight proved surprisingly hard to hang on to however. Provoked and obstinate, he struggled and fought against the restraint, wanting to finish his fight.

Like oil thrown onto a fire, the pair's tempers fed off each other. He could well remember the phenomena. Studying it from an outsider's perspective, he marveled how anyone at court had ever had any doubts of their intimacy. The pair of them snapping and snarling until finally there were only two ways it could have gone. Either Kain would knock his infuriating lieutenant to the ground and spare him, or kill him. At first Raziel had been too useful and beautiful to kill, later, it slowly formalized into something of a game between them. Raziel, knowing he could never truly win against his sire, became a hawk tamed to the hand. Never anything close to sedate, he was content with testing the limits of his lord's resolve without driving him to murder, and himself? Well, he'd taken considerable pleasure in finding new ways of exacting compensation for the headaches his favorite inspired.

The dynamic was entirely different now, however. Several hundred years older, and stronger than the fledgling, the Raziel of the here-and-now seemed more than willing to test himself against the potential threat of the Reaver in order to make his point to Kain. Without the sword, Kain really didn't give the youth a chance of defeating the knight. If the two were to fight, a death would be almost unavoidable. He couldn't let it happen. The sword had somehow remained oblivious to the knight's presence for the better part of three days. He didn't dare think what would happen if it came in conflict with the vampire, even for an instant.

Raziel wrenched free from his distracted fingers, smiling wickedly. Dancing out of Kain's reach he raising his weapon in challenge, calling once more to the fledgling stalking him. "I am not afraid of you, infant. I've seen what you will become. And if my choice is to go back to that future, or make my stand here, I choose to stand! You want Kain? Try and take him from me!"

"As you wish." The youth swept forward with a snarl, letting the Soul Reaver's fire guide him forward. He and his blade both thirsted for blood.

Seeing that his foolish ally was actually willing to meet the challenge head-on, Kain silently apologized to both Raziels for the awkwardness of the situation before lunging forward to knock the vampire off his feet. It was child's play, once the knight was pushed off balance, for Kain to grab hold of his shoulder and belt. Kain swung the vampire around and out of the way of his alter-ego's attack, releasing him at the apex of his swing to tumble across the floor of the platform.

The knight yelped in pain as he landed on a wing and rolled to a stop against the base of a Pillar, picking up a generous layer of filth in the process. Kain could not respond to the vampire's thwarted cursing however, he was too busy dodging his younger self's irate counter-attack. Too angry to be elegant, the fledgling swung wildly with his now ravenous soul sword. The brilliant aura of the blade was near blinding as it swept past the end of Kain's nose, his reflexes pulling himself out of the path of the sword by the barest margin as the blade wailed and cleaved the air. Somehow the Reaver sounded more menacing when in the child's hands than in his own; a difference of perspective perhaps? He did not care for the sensation of being prey.

Somehow he dodged several of the sweeping attacks, ducking and mist shifting to clear the radius of immediate danger and put a safe distance between them. He marveled at his luck as he wiped the dirt from his gauntlets, eying the youth warily. Either the fledgling was too innocent, or too angry to realize that he could lean on the Reaver's more magical powers to slow or pin an enemy in place. Kain wondered that the sword didn't volunteer its assistance as it had with his battle with Audron, but couldn't honestly complain that it didn't. Had Raziel's soul truly wanted to crush him, he doubted he would be able to muster much of a defense. The memory of his failure at Avernus was still fresh at hand. Certainly he had been reluctant to strike the final blow, but Raziel had undoubtedly had magical skill and strength to match his own. They had been devilishly evenly matched. There was also the fact that it had chewed easily through Janos' defenses, Hylden-possessed or not. Kain was confident the sword had the capacity to stop him, so either the sword didn't truly wish to fight him, or it didn't know with whom it fought?

Lunging forwards, Kain grappled with his fledgling. Capturing the youth's wrists in his own fists, he forced the boy's arms, and so his sword to the side. Thwarted but not yet disarmed, the fledgling threw his shoulder against Kain's chest, hoping to break free.

"You bastard." The younger vampire hissed at him in annoyance. "I thought you wanted to die!"

"You were going to kill him!" Kain snarled, annoyed all over again that he had to point out the obvious. Hot headed as the vampire was, had he already forgotten what he had agreed to? "I told you, he has to go back to the future!"

"Dead now, or later, what does it matter!"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you." Kain replied grimly, countering the vampire's struggles for freedom. "Promise me." He barked, not above pulverizing the youth's wrists if that was what it took to sway him from his murderous ambition. "Promise me you'll see him safely to his era!"

"You're a fool!" The youth bared his teeth.

"Promise me!" Kain repeated.

Too close to safely let go, given his opponent's increasingly foul temper, he hung on and tried to think of some plan. His claws bit easily through the gaps in the steel gauntlets, but the fledgling did little more than flinch, seeming to gain in strength and stamina with each passing minute. Kain couldn't fathom how the man was resisting him, and then the white glow running along the armored arm fed him an unwelcome clue. Raziel. The boy was not yet savvy enough to utilize the blade's magic, but the sword had initiative enough to keep the vampire from harm. It was healing and supporting the youth even as it had done for him over the past several days. The fledgling was functionally invincible so long as he held onto the damned blade.

Kain swore and renewed his efforts to subdue the nobleman. His fingers grew warm with the tickle of the Soul Reaver's fire, his former lieutenant's consciousness tracing along his current master's arm and so over to his own. Feeling the distant burst of startled recognition from the sword, Kain acted instinctively, head butting his younger-self sharply and leaping backwards out of range. His own forehead, evolved and armored with thick bone ridges over the years, ought to have been more than a match for the more human-styled wielder of the Reaver blade. However he found his battery once again insufficient. The Soul Reaver's master would not be taken down so easily. Instead of staggering backwards in confusion and pain, the boy flailed forwards, wildly striking at him with his now-free sword arm.

One hand clamped to his face, the vampire had to be half stunned by the sudden blow to the head, but that did not stop him. Kain felt the sting of the Reaver's edge biting into his shoulder even as he tried to mist out of the way of the strike. His minor enchantment refused to take, drawn into the blade's core even as the sword pinned him, bones and joints frozen by the enchanted aura.

"Swear to me, this farce is over. And I'll make that promise." The fledgling's breath was ragged as he lowered the hand pressed to his forehead. A rapidly fading bruise on his temple was the only external evidence that their brawling had affected him at all.

Kain opened his mouth to accept the offer, but his answer was silenced by the cold burn of Raziel's fire as the blade's energy poured through him. For an eerie moment he was positive that he had lost, that he would be consumed. His every muscle felt as though it was alight, his eyes dazzled by the magical brand in front of him. He blinked, and wondered that he still could. Instead of carving a deadly furrow through his chest, the blade seemed content to hold fast at just a scratch. The weapon rested feather-light against his shoulder as he half-knelt against the Pillar's subterranean platform, caught between falling and dodging the strike.

Looking past the Reaver's incandescent edge, he caught sight of his fledgling's contorted face. The boy looked to be straining with all his might against the immovable mass of the sword's hilt. The blade, it seemed, was stuck. Kain resisted the urge to laugh out loud at the fledgling's useless efforts. It was a scenario that he himself had experienced only days before. Until the Soul Reaver's cooperation could be won, the young vampire might strain to move it for the rest of time and get absolutely nowhere.

"Kain." He tried to get the youth's attention, feeling he ought to explain to the baffled vampire what was happening. Young Kain seemed able to put two-and-two together without his assistance however.

Snarling, the fledgling glared at his blade. "What is the meaning of this?! Do as I say, you hunk of useless pig-iron! You belong to me now, not him!"

Kain shook his head in disbelief that it had come to this. The Reaver, the weapon that until now he had feared as much as he had cherished, was defending him, even from itself. Raziel's perverse loyalty to him remained, despite all the odds.

He closed his eyes, marveling at the absurdity of life, even as he appreciated the compliment paid him by his silent ally. They had come a long way together, each following his own path as they sometimes ran parallel, and sometimes intersected down through the long centuries. Always meeting and parting, and meeting again… Until this moment?

It was strange to think this was the end.

/ Where is your rage now, child? / He asked the blade wonderingly, feeling the tingle of Raziel's awareness along his skin.

Irony-of-ironies, that he had worked so hard to talk his lieutenant out of killing him at Avernus, and failed. And now he was obliged to try and argue the opposite, with equally poor results. He projected his thoughts to the stubborn sword pressed against his shoulder, knowing it could hear him. / Strike!/

/ Is this not what you sought for so long? Is this not what you are owed? Kill me and save Nosgoth! Kill me and take your revenge! / Kain felt the blade shiver in response, but still it did not budge. The scratch it had begun along his shoulder itched slightly as the astral flames ghosted over his skin.

_What if you're wrong?_

The sword buzzed angrily, causing its new wielder to grimace in pain as he clung to the hilt. Kain snorted softly, amazed that even now Raziel could be so contrary. The one time he needed his lieutenant to be vindictive and head-strong, the man was inclined to stubbornly rationalize? The world was truly tilted on its ear.

/ Remember your wings, Raziel! / He goaded the sword. The bitter tang of his former lieutenant's fury echoed back at him immediately, proving he had struck a nerve.

/ Kill me! / He encouraged the wraith. / Do you suppose I wept for you as I ordered you into the abyss?! We do what we must. This is no time for remorse. The damned monster beneath us is laughing with every moment we delay! /

_Kain… there will be no turning back! _

/ Set me free, Raziel. / Kain reached up to grab the side of the blade beneath the hilt, adding his efforts to the youngster's feeble attempt to push the sword into his chest. White flames burned against his arms, alternately scalding hot and freezing cold but doing no damage.

Dropping the last of his mental barriers, he allowed the spirit's consciousness to entwine with his, unfettered, trying to convince it of his resolve. / I'm tired, child. Too old and bitter to do justice to the titles bestowed upon me. It is too late. Better to stand aside for a fresh champion to take up the burden, don't you agree? I leave the young one in your keeping. I don't envy you the task of molding him into a hero, but I know you'll manage somehow. You always do. /

_If this is truly your wish. I will not refuse you._

/ It is. / He sighed in relief, feeling the blade's resolve firming at last. / For Nosgoth. /

_For Nosgoth. _ Kain could have sworn that he heard Raziel's tired voice agreeing with him in the mental caress. A trick of his own exhausted brain perhaps. He would make the sacrifice required. It was what he owed, to the man, to the world. Searching his own consciousness for any hint of dismay or protest, he was surprised to find there was none. For once even his most cynical aspects were silent. A Kain would fall, and yet Kain would live. Looking up, he caught the fledgling's eye, distracting the boy from his frustration.

"The king is dead." He smirked, accepting his fate. "Long live the king."

888888888888888888

The Soul Reaver's cry turned despairing as it relinquished its hold on the fledgling's arm. Still puzzling out the meaning of Kain's final declaration, his younger self staggered as his desperate pulls resulted in an immediate and unexpected movement of the blade. Comprehension dawned in the handsome vampire's face as he caught himself with python grace, shifting his stance to come about again. The boy shouted in triumph as he hauled the sword back to strike again, this time certain of his victory.

"Vae Victus!"

Compelling himself to relax into the inevitable blow, Kain closed his eyes, not particularly interested in seeing the Reaver work its magic on his tired corpse. Blind to the room around him, he did not notice the shadow diving between himself and the writhing blade of light swinging down from above. He did notice the heavy collision against his shoulder. Kain was knocked sideways, almost head-over-heels along the platform by the violence of the shove. Blinking up at the shadowy ceiling of the cavern he acknowledged the reality of the sharp gravel digging into his arm and back and realized his plan had been utterly derailed. "What in the hell?"

Pushing himself off the floor, Kain swore sharply and with feeling. In his sudden fit of martyrdom he'd stupidly forgotten about the other Raziel. The thrice damned templar had intercepted the downward stroke with his own battered weapon, parrying the blade to the side, his face a mask of intense concentration as he faced off against the fledgling Balance Guardian. A second hit from the Reaver sheared Raziel's sword completely in two, the soul stealing blade more than a match for conventional steel. Casting the broken weapon aside, his foundling-Raziel grappled barehanded with the young vampire he fought, much as he had done moments before.

If Kain had had a heart, it would have stopped cold at the sight. This was it. The moment he had been trying to avoid from the very instant he had brought the templar back in time to this world. Two Soul Reavers were again in conflict, and he had no idea what the consequence would be this time. If the blade fed on the alternate future's Raziel, would that mean that two souls would inhabit it? Or would any soul belonging to Raziel be weighted as Raziel's soul when the accounting was done; the infinite composite accepting yet another incoming sliver.

There was no explosion to herald the catastrophe. No shriek of astral pain or sense of cosmic foreboding. Raziel deftly deflected the fledgling vampire's elbow, when the nobleman tried to break his nose, and still wrestling with the youth, twisted out of the way of the blade's sharp edge as it swung at his head and wings. Shifting his grip down the vampire's arms and onto the hilt of the boy's sword as it passed within reach, he managed the feat of pulling the blade from young Kain's grasp as if the chore was commonplace. Raziel redirected the sword's momentum in his favor as soon as control was his. Wielding the pommel as a club, he dealt an ugly blow to the boy's head with the backswing.

The fledgling fell to the ground with a cry of dismay, Raziel standing over him with a look of satisfaction. Automatically conditioned from years of warfare to claim the captured weapon as his own, he brought the sword into a two handed stance as he awaited the vampire's next move. The twisted contour of the Soul Reaver wavered in the air as the blade responded to its new bearer's aura, but its light did not extinguish. It did not shatter.

Kain had gotten no further than upright as the rapid takedown had occurred. Sucking a startled breath past his teeth, he stared at the tableau, wondering what it all meant. No blood had been drawn. The sword had not directly impacted his lieutenant in any way. Without the actual collision, would it still count as a cataclysm? Or had fate just dealt him a card from the bottom of the deck? He had no plan for such an eventuality, and was inclined to expect the worst. But nothing happened. The world remained, exactly as it had been a moment before.

The Reaver while still bathed in showy spangles and astral flames, remained just a sword. Raziel while panting from his recent exertion was otherwise unruffled.

Breath was stolen from Kain's lungs as soon as he dared relax. He felt almost relieved as the cosmos proved his paranoia well justified. Spectral fire raced up his new lieutenant's unwary arm as if fanned by a gale, engulfing the vampire from head to foot before he could do more than flinch. The Soul Reaver's song swelled into an incredulous roar as the sword recognized its new host. The sound grew louder and louder until the cry itself was an assault, compelling Kain's fledgling-self to scrabble across the stone floor to gain precious distance, driving Kain back to his knees.

"Raziel!" He winced against the light and cacophony, forcing himself forward against the opposing forces in an instinctive attempt to separate the pair of them before the vampire was consumed. This time, the Reaver seemed prepared for his interference. Kain felt his fingers repelled by an invisible barrier even as he came within grabbing-distance, claws scraping uselessly against thin air and translucent flames mere inches from his goal. He fought against it a moment before what he was seeing truly sunk in.

The fire wasn't destroying Raziel. It was protecting him? The Soul Reaver's aura burned along his lieutenant's skin and ruffled his rags and feathers without harm. The templar stood at the center of an incandescent maelstrom of half-manifested reality, eyes closed as if lost in a dream. The intensity of the energies the Reaver was emitting increased, along with the volume of its outraged cry, driving Kain backwards again, away from the vampire with a wall of sound, wind, and invisible force. Wincing and shielding his eyes against the impossible brightness, Kain had to tilt his face away, eyes streaming as they tried to adapt to the suddenly hostile environment.

Sword and lieutenant both were little more than a glow of white at the heart of a column of compressed energy. Grit was flung in all directions as a cyclone's worth of air spun in the confined chamber, casting debris and water up against the walls of the room as it sought to escape. The roof of the cavern buckled and exploded outwards as the magical pressure reached its peak, pushing in all directions. Kain wondered if his eardrums would survive the explosion unscathed as the world concussed around him. A slew of falling shale and splashing impacts filled the room as the wind whistled and shrieked, growing momentarily stronger still as it found its way upwards to freedom. Large chunks of the above-ground shrine crashed downwards as the pressure abruptly faded, fracturing and cracking the stone shelf they stood on and threatening to send the entire shrine plunging to the bottom of the lake. Moats of light gathered and swirled in the air, closing the gaps where the fractured columns from the bottom platform ought to have joined with the remaining stumps on the above-ground shrine, hinting at where the broken Pillars should have stood uninterrupted.

Half deafened by the cacophony of crashes and wailing winds, Kain blinked against the sudden silence, realizing he was crouching like a fool waiting for the sky to fall. Glancing across the still blinding radiance of Raziel's aura, he could just make out his alter ego's terrified expression. The boy had been blown backwards a short distance, but was still very much alive. Having no serious claws of his own yet, the fledgling had sensibly clung to the base of a Pillar for the worst of the blow, eyes still squeezed tightly-closed against the painful windborne debris and light. Content that his past-future hadn't been inadvertently cut short, Kain concentrated on his primary worry.

"Raziel?" He called out to the corona of light at the center of the Pillar's shrine, unable to tell whether he shouting or not due to the ringing in his ears.

The energy, and noise, abated with each passing moment, the storm of magic spending itself and evaporating into the heavens until it was imperceptible from the weak sunlight now bathing the platform. Looking around the room, Kain saw, as well as felt, the characteristic blur of temporal distortion. Reality was visibly vibrating, the walls seeming to flex in response to the rapid beating of some cosmic heart. He blinked as his stomach protested the disorienting sight.

Just like in William-the-Just's chapel. The meeting of two Reavers had proven too much for the continuum to bear. The phenomena itself wasn't dangerous, but it heralded a critical turning point to come. Looking back at the source of their time-rift, he found everything very much as it had been before. Raziel was standing calmly with the Reaver in hand, seemingly unaffected by the power he had inadvertently released. The vampire's wings ruffled with the ozone laden breeze, fanning outwards as if preparing for flight, but at least he was no longer wreathed in astral flames.

"Raziel." Kain spoke the knight's name again, voice sounding tired and strained in his battered ears. He found himself entirely ignored.

The vampire was staring at one of his three fingered hands as if it was an unspeakable marvel. His other remained wrapped firmly around the hilt of the Soul Reaver, almost entirely encased in the witch-fire that still crackled along the length of the blade and up his arm. Taking an audible breath, Raziel reached up and rubbed his face, bemusedly feeling along his jaw and neck. Combing his fingers through his hair, the dusty filth that came away also seemed to also be a source of amusement. The vampire leaned back, fanning his wings wide and stretching them up and over his head, pinions spread in a dappled array of smoky grey. Raziel stared upwards at the massive feathery appendages rising above his shoulders for a long moment, seeming entranced by the very idea of them.

Softly at first, and then with increasing energy, Raziel began to laugh.

His sudden outburst of bitter laughter broke the shocked silence of the room. The shrine was ruined, and reality dangled by a thread, yet Raziel chuckled heartily, arms wrapped around himself to support his ribs as he almost doubled over in cynical mirth. Something in their predicament had tickled the vampire's sense of the absurd, and it took several minutes for the knight to regain some semblances of control over his reaction. Raziel shook his head as his amusement abated. Stretching his wings a second time with a small smile, he seemed to be enjoying some private joke. Kain took a breath and stood, baffled by the reaction and intending to confront his lieutenant, but froze as the vampire turned abruptly and pinned him with a stare.

The knight's wings folded against his spine with silent grace, massive pinions pleating together with mechanical precision. The vampire's now brilliantly glowing eyes were strangely easy to read. Raziel's mood rapidly shifted from incredulous through irritated to settle on grimly-resigned.

Kain felt himself weighed in that second silence as never before, wondering what exactly Raziel saw, now that he was wielder of the Reaver, once more his own master. Minutes dragged on after one another as the dust settled, and still the man said nothing. Resisting the urge to flinch, Kain wondered if he would have to be the one break the silence, just to relieve the itch of being inspected so closely.

"You are such a bastard, Kain." Raziel declared at last.

Strangely the insult, or rather its world-weary delivery, was enough to bring a smile to his lips. Kain dusted himself off, released from his stasis by the vampire's dour appraisal. Nodding, he accepted the accusation, owning it as a fair assessment, from one who knew him better than he likely knew himself. Somehow, in a way he couldn't even begin to explain, he knew it was his Raziel that spoke. The knight's appearance hadn't changed, but his aura was that of a far more familiar, if less biddable creature.

There were so many questions to ask, he realized, and so little time. "You are…"

"I cannot believe you!" Raziel exclaimed abruptly. "I simply cannot comprehend how you justified to yourself using this poor idiot the way you did! Did you honestly think, for a moment that this was a good idea?"

The vampire waved off his attempt to answer, too angry to be interested in explanations. It was undeniably his Raziel. Even the furious set of his jaw was achingly familiar. A part of him spared a worry for the other Raziel's wellbeing, but it was a cruelly small part, compared to the overwhelming sense of relief that his Raziel had not been harmed by the encounter. He couldn't help the bubble of joy that rose in his chest, even with his favorite warming up to a proper tirade.

Raziel didn't stop for more than a breath. "So help me god, Kain. If you intended for this insanity to happen, I swear I will do far worse than just carve out your heart this time. You are the most insufferably perverse creature in the universe. I begin to see why the false god in the pit has been tying itself in knots over you for the past thousand years. Even healed of Nuraptor's madness, your plots are incomprehensible to anyone but yourself." Pausing, he tilted his head as if listening to something, and then grimaced again. "I don't know which of your supposed plans I find more inexplicable! Blithely allowing this idiot to challenge Kain for you, knowing full well what would happen? Or your ambition of cramming him into Moebius' thrice damned machine a second time to return to his pathetic future, and assuming that nothing of any import would change! Really, Kain? That was the best you could come up with?"

"He's been a bit of a conundrum, actually." Kain shrugged, dispensing with any pretense of omniscience for the moment. Raziel would undoubtedly call him on it if he tried, although old habits were hard to break. "I'd have asked your advice, but I didn't think you'd take the news particularly well. Now I see of course… that I was completely right."

"I really hate you some days." Raziel remarked, suddenly calm, if still more than a little bitter. He rubbed the back of his neck habitually to postpone an impending headache, moving in his borrowed body as if he had been born in it. "Today I think is going to be one of those days."

"If I may plead my case, child. I was searching for a copy of myself when I found your alter-ego instead. I had no particular ambition to exploit you again, but I was rather desperate for an able-bodied assistant with you taken out of the game so abruptly."

"Another Kain?" The vampire stared horrified, first at him, then at the youth still cowering next to the Pillars. "There's already two of you! How many more did you think it would take to manage your crack-brained schemes? What the hell would you have done with the spares? Have me kill them too?"

"Don't be daft, child. They'd have been returned to their times just as the boy was supposed to be." Kain looked around at the utter destruction of the underground shrine and had to shake his head. Raziel's awakening had done an excellent job of finishing the work the false-god had started. The platform they stood on had cracks as wide as a man's arm running through it, a mere hair away from crumbling entirely into the water. At least with the ceiling gone, he could transform or teleport to safety.

Thinking of his own neck made him consider his until-now-ally's situation. "What of the Raziel who ought to be speaking to me? What has become of him?"

"Did I devour him, you mean to ask." The vampire looked at him measuringly. "And what if I did?"

Kain couldn't help but feel chagrined at the cool question, knowing it showed on his face. His former lieutenant tilted his head and smiled slowly, seeming pleased with his concern. "Have no fears, Kain. Raziel is unharmed by his experience. If anything he's found it… most enlightening. I- We- have been having a little chat. A most unique conversation, I assure you."

Looking down at the young Kain slowly untangling himself from the Pillar, Raziel snorted in cynical amusement. "Well, not so unique, now that I think about it. But you did bring this on yourself." He looked back at Kain. "We are causing merry-hell with the timeline, all of us here like this, aren't we…"

"Most likely." Kain gestured at the room around them, drawing Raziel's attention to the way the walls faded and flexed like a desert mirage at midday. He raised an eyebrow, willing to ask for an independent analysis now that he had the luxury to do so. "What do you make of all of this?"

"I think you've made a royal mess of things." Raziel answered dryly as he gazed up at the lip of the cavern above them. "More so than your usual, at any rate."

Battered grasses hung over the edge of their pit, easily half of the above-ground shrine had dropped in with them. Somehow the Pillars had escaped the calamity, the edge of the blast just barely grazing back of the surface-platform. Stone had been chipped away from the closest of the columns, revealing that the magical artifact did indeed pierce all the way through the surface shrine on its way to the lower level and from there down to heart of the world. Wrought by magic, the Pillars had none of the seams or sections that a conventional monument would require. Before breaking, they had run straight and true as one continuous length from heaven to hell.

"And I'm sure you could have done better." Kain flicked a claw-tip at the far wall of their sanctuary, pointing out a large section as it fractured and broke away, sliding into the water with a groaning splash.

"This was not my fault!" The vampire threw him a look of disgust. "Had I known there was another Raziel running around, I'd have tried to avoid colliding with him! Swords can't see Kain. I was assuming you'd tell me something of that magnitude rather than keeping it as a nasty little surprise."

"And here I thought you'd be entertained by meeting another version of yourself. You seemed willing enough to adapt to another Kain." He couldn't help himself, knowing he shouldn't goad his lieutenant's temper further didn't stop his tongue from slipping.

Turning to face the fledgling, watching as the youth slowly found his feet, Raziel grimaced expressively. "I confess. I have a hard time tallying what I have seen thus far of your history with what I remember of you from my own beginnings. To think that I considered you pompous ass back when I was an infant! Only now to discover that the 'you' I remember was an improvement over how you started? It's a wonder we lasted a thousand years. I'd have wagered the armies revolting and butchering you after the first decade."

"Yes, well." Kain shrugged. "Vorador did make a habit of knocking me down and kicking me on a regular basis for the first few years after the Second Crusade. Then the Third Crusade came along and set me on my backside for a considerable span… By the time I got around to raising you and the other delinquents, I had somewhat mastered the art of not speaking my more… impolitic thoughts aloud."

"I see that." Raziel half smiled at the abbreviated history. "I suppose I can grant that you became a little wiser, as you grew older. This one, however, seems destined to become more hidebound and close-minded, if my contemporary's memories are to be believed. How strange, that a few fateful choices and events in this age could affect the personalities of those who will live hundreds of years later so dramatically..."

"Even the smallest beat of a butterfly's wing may affect the path of a summer storm." Kain quoted aloud. Raziel gave him a long look, not at all amused by the sophistry. He shrugged in silent agreement that now was probably not the time for philosophical citations, no matter how relevant they were to the current situation. Kain opted to explain his original intention instead. "If we can but convince him that the Oracle is a fraud; that would be a step in the right direction. I thought."

Raziel raised an eloquent eyebrow at the idea. Folding his arms across his chest again, he stared down at the platform beneath them, and very possibly through it, seeming to ponder the squid's recent antics.

"What the hell is going on?" The fledgling had found voice at last, staring at Raziel in dismay before glaring at Kain. "Why does the sword cleave to this one more intently than to either of us? Who is he?"

"No one of any importance." Raziel stated firmly, quelling further revelations. Giving the blond vampire a thoughtful look, he seemed to weigh his options and then shook his head. "Hush now and be obedient for a time, little one. This old reprobate and I have a measure of catching up to do."

"That's my sword!" The youth protested. "Give it back."

"Your sword?" The dark haired vampire blinked at the boy. The incredulous glare he focused on the younger vampire was all together too familiar. Kain resisted the urge to grin, realizing in hindsight that if Vorador had lived long enough to see his constant wrangling with Raziel at the dawn of the empire, he would have laughed himself sick. The youth's outrage, and Raziel's resultant consternation, had an undeniably comedic element to it.

Raziel, of course, was too focused on setting the boy in his place to notice. "Yours? No child. No, I think not. Not yet at any rate, and really, not ever. The sword ismine. You may carry it for a time, but in the end, it always was, and will be, mine."

"It belongs to the Scion of Balance!" Young Kain disagreed angrily, still failing to see the connection.

"Do I?" Raziel turned and gave Kain an arch look, ignoring the young vampire's complaint. "Belong to you?"

"You could just as easily say I belong to you, child. It's one and the same." Kain replied candidly, raking his hair into some semblance of order, refusing to be baited by the undertones in the playfully testing question. Some last remnant of his pride resisted the confession despite the obviousness of it. Raziel was always about forcing out into the air that which was already known to all involved. Most likely he simply enjoyed making him uncomfortable. In retaliation he let the words come out as if the fact was of commonplace importance, not above adding a twist of his own. "Neither of us seems to be of any use without the other."

"How true." His lieutenant sighed, folding his hands atop the Soul Reaver's hilt as he let the sword's tip rest against the floor. Looking around their crumbling shrine and up through the now vanished-roof at the sky beyond, Raziel gave the concept due consideration. Eventually he turned back to Kain, lips twitching into a sardonic half smile. "We seem to have managed moderately well together recently, at any rate. While I have not always been thrilled to be slung across your shoulders like so much furniture for the better part of ten centuries, at least it was more entertaining than being sunk into a well and forgotten about."

Kain blinked, disturbed once again by the false-future he had heard his other Raziel predict. Even more disturbing was his lieutenants ability to joke about it. "You… know about that? How-"

Raziel tapped his forehead expressively. "I have his memories, Kain. As well as those left from my other-soul, the one that was in your blade… those are a bit of a muddle however. About what you'd expect from a tattered wraith that went mad centuries ago." His voice was light, amused sounding, but there was a grim undertone beneath. "Thankfully I do not seem to be able to recollect the future of the Raziel who ended up imprisoned in the well. I can't imagine that experience would be any better than my first time around with you."

Wincing, Kain wondered if an apology would even begin to cover the damage done. "Had I known sooner, that it was you…"

"You'd have likely reacted much as this one has." The sword-now-vampire gestured inclusively at the fledgling standing shocked at his side. "Guilt, envy, and fear of reprisal, would have made you cast the blade aside centuries before you realized you needed it. Neededme." The last statement became almost a question, as if Raziel was daring him to disagree.

"I- Nosgoth needs you, Raziel. I have no doubt of it." He saw the glint of amusement in his offspring's eyes at his slip, but the man was considerate enough not to call him on it. Deciding to distract the vampire with a question of his own, he addressed the immediate concern. "The Soul Reaver is unharmed? Meeting yourself… it did no damage?"

"I'm not feeling particularly shattered, if that's what you're getting at." Raziel snorted softly. Holding his blade aloft, he inspected its sinuous length critically. The Reaver blade was alive as it had rarely ever been before, still static metal, yet there was a strong impression of motion. Spiritual fire twisted in and around the blade like a shadow of what it ought to be. Kain found the effect rather dizzying as it occurred to him the blade very likely was bending, pulled this way and that by the warping of reality. Existing equally in every plane and future, the sword's very shape might be the result of the convoluted nature of time and space? Thinking about it gave Kain a headache.

Raziel wasn't waiting for him to gather his thoughts. He forced himself to pay attention as the man resumed his musings. "It seems that, if anything, it was the other Raziel that was imperiled by the encounter. Had the blade truly wounded him, we might not be speaking so conveniently now. But luckily he was a more competent brawler than your fledgling gave him credit for, and took hold of me voluntarily. Thus I was able to realize what was happening soon enough to interrupt the process somewhat."

"Somewhat?"

"We are unavoidably intertwined, I fear." Raziel gestured with his sword hand, twisting the blade in an artful curve. Kain blinked, realizing that the vampire was unable to shift his fingers along the sword's grip. Reaver and man were bound to each other once more, the spiritual fusion exhibiting itself in the material realm.

Raziel seemed rather unconcerned by the development, shrugging candidly. "Until one of the two of us is destroyed, we seem to be stuck with one another. Not unexpected, given how your sword once cleaved whole-heartedly to me but still, it does require us to consider our next moves in the face of this development. At least we seem to be able to cohabit without causing eachother undue distress. I have the impression that he finds the ability to defer to me in these matters something of a relief."

Kain could only marvel as the now dual Raziel adapted to his new circumstance. The last lingering breezes of the Reaver's initial outburst had slowly but surely wicked the worst of the dust and fug out of their unlikely oubliette. But that didn't necessarily mean the place was any more habitable than before. Water was steadily seeping up through the cracks in the platform. BBut escape was readily at hand. Was there any need to linger in the inhospitable place further? The broken Pillars, forgotten in the sudden excitement reminded him that he still had a job to finish.

Given the choice of dying on solid ground versus being left at the bottom of a monster-infested subterranean lake, Kain felt strongly that some fresh air and open sky would be preferred. Crossing to where his alter-ego stood, he checked the fledgling over for undue injury from his recent adventures. The vampire looked more than a little at-a-loss, but was otherwise no worse for the wear. He caught the boy by the shoulder-plate of his armor before it occurred to the youth that he could bolt once again. "Perhaps we should take this opportunity to be free of this place?" He framed his intention as a question to Raziel.

His second almost smiled at his politic phrasing and considered the unrecognizable shrine around them. "Perhaps you're right. I think we've done all the damage we can do here. Shall we see what other ancient ruins we can disrupt before dinner?"

Kain shook his head at Raziel's sarcasm, gesturing that he might as well lead the way upwards to the relative safety of the surface.

88888888888888888888

A paranoid flicker of awareness came a moment too late. Kain had spent too long wholly focused on the events developing in front of him, forgetting that their reunion had an audience out of sight. Even as the impulse to check over his shoulder began, he knew he had been out maneuvered yet again. A blow caught him from chest to skull, the wet tonnage of a tree-trunk sized tentacle crushing him down and forwards into the gravel-strewn surface of the shrine's floor. Air was pressed out of his lungs with the force of the heavy impact, his eyes going momentarily dark as his forehead cracked painfully against the carved platform. A second weight, as undeniable as the first, crushed him down further; causing his supposedly-iron-hard bones to grind against one another fit to break.

"Enough, Kain!" The echoing voice seemed to be inside of his head, Kain could taste blood as he tried to regain his wits. Face compressed against the floor as it was, he realized could hear the false god's voice from up through the stone itself. Willing his body to move, to escape the crushing pressure, was all well and good, but it didn't change the fact that he was pinned like a bit of road-kill beneath a wagon-wheel.

"What the hell is that thing?!" Knocked to the side as Kain fell, his younger-self scrabbled out of the way of the dripping mass of tentacles.

"Kain!" Raziel was faster to recognize the danger, but even he was caught by the ancient monster's tactic.

At least the old beast had shown itself at last. Kain felt a burst of bitter pleasure at the sound of the fledgling's horrified question, even as his ribs protested bitterly. The false-prophet had returned, coiling up from the lake bed to the young vampire's dismay. Clearly the boy had already made the connection between the benevolent voice and the gruesome tentacles. It was unlikely that even it could talk its way back into the youth's good graces, for all its eloquence. Half crushed and blinded by the weight pinning him down, he found wasn't too proud to ask for help.

/ Raziel? /

The angry thrum of the Reaver as it carved through the air was heartening, but still the weight on his back remained. Kain grimaced as he felt additional ropes of muscle tangling his legs again, drawing him backwards across the platform even as Raziel fought to reach him. Wincing as he was dragged face first through the painful grit, Kain realized the elder god sought to pull him under. Without the Reaver's aid, he would burn just as surely as any other vampire, a lingering and painful way to die.

Just as quickly, he wondered if this too was part and parcel of being Balance. A death was a death. The Pillars wouldn't care what the means were so long as the end resulted. Had he not stood calmly by as Raziel had been cast forth into the water? How perfect was it that he too would feel the unjustified torment?

"Kain!" Raziel at least, didn't sound pleased at the development. And the vampire seemed to be making headway against his foes. Kain wasn't altogether surprised. Seemingly, the Elder God had no particular means of defending itself against a direct attack from the Reaver's fire. The tentacles around him crackled and sparked, burning in a very real sense as they came in contact with the purifying might of the Reaver's aura. Hearing the distant agonized cry of pain beneath the water brought a smile to his face despite the soreness of his jaw.

Finding the resolve to not be dragged down by the deluded squid, Kain found the will to dig his claws into the surface of the platform, slowing, but not stopping his inexorable slide backwards. The false god was not dissuaded by the attack, or his stubborn attempts to anchor himself. Kain felt as much as heard the deep crack of shattering rock, the section of platform beneath him giving way in a swirl of muddy water. For a moment he was dunked. The immediate and burning pain of water eating into his skin was enough to make him gasp. But seemingly the squid was not entirely done with him yet. Hauling him up in its clutches, it dangled him above the lake, taunting Raziel with him as he coughed and dripped blood and water.

"You cannot save him, Raziel." The Elder God's voice had an almost regretful tone as it spoke to the winged vampire readying to come to his rescue. Kain coughed again, lungs too compressed by the thick bindings of the monster's limbs to either agree or argue. God how it stung. He'd grown forgetful of how much he disliked the burn of water after centuries of not having to worry about anything more annoying than rain. But Raziel was now categorically immune, was he not? The fact that his lieutenant was capable of following him into the lake didn't necessarily mean that he wanted it.

"You have been a most disagreeable servant, Raziel." The ancient fiend conceded, ignoring his musings. "Even so, you have been useful in your way. But now you have gone too far. The Soul Reaver cannot be its own master! It has always been a tool of another. That is its destiny. Your free will is no more. You made your choice. It is to the sword's destiny you must answer to from that moment forward."

"I don't believe you, foulness." Raziel shook his wings out, not swayed by the arguments presented. "Unhand him at once, and I'll grant you a quick death. More than that I will not promise you."

"I have seen every future, little fool. A myriad of possibility, a host of potentiality… And I assure you… in not a one, is there ever again, a Raziel." The deep voice from beneath the water sighed, as if confiding an unpleasant truth to a friend. "For you there is no future. For the sword, well, that is another matter."

"Redeemer and destroyer." The false-god's loud proclamation caused Raziel to flinch backwards just as the fledgling next to him did, startled by the volume as much as the reminder of the ancient's prophesy. "That is what both races named your coming at the end of their bitter war. The sword of Blight or the sword of Balance, which is it to be. Now is the final moment. The final choice. Do you go with the vampire at your side? To be his sword and the world's salvation? You renounced your Hylden champion already. But I warn you, that even the lack of choice, is still a choice… A Reaver that will not serve has no place in the skein of history… To exist as a servant to the Kain destined to master you, or to not exist at all, Raziel. Choose now."

Chuckling darkly, the ancient oracle sighed. "Either way, I have already won."

"No!" Raziel protested. "I refuse. There is always a path that you conceal…"

"The Hylden might make you a better offer." The elder god chuckled again. "But I doubt it."

"I cannot believe we have come this far just to fail now." Raziel hissed, dismayed. "Kain! What am I to do?"

Hanging like so much meat in a butcher shop's window, Kain blinked, amazed by the question. After years of never listening to his council, now the child was expecting him to produce an epiphany? He found the terms offered as intolerable as his offspring, but crushed and exhausted as he was, he couldn't come up with an alternate course of action. So long as his other-self lived, and had the sword's loyalty, there would be opportunity to defeat the false-god again at a later time. Better a delay in gratification than to accept immediate obliteration.

Raziel seemed to read his look, wings drooping visibly as he saw how tidily they were trapped, yet again.

"We haven't failed, not yet." The fledgling declared grimly, reminding all in the room that he was more than a mere observer. "These two fools may be hamstrung. But I am still free!"

Flinging one axe after the other, young vampire sent Havoc and Malice hurling across the gap in the platform, carving cleanly through the tentacles holding Kain aloft. Grabbing him with a coil of telekinetic ability, the youth caught him even as he fell into the water, yanking him violently forwards and into Raziel's stunned arms.

"You will never be free, Kain." The dark god beneath the water disagreed. His disembodied voice sounded closer than ever as the water shivered and rippled around them.

Kain struggled to disentangle himself from Raziel's confused grip, mindful of the Soul Reaver's edge as he got his bearings. The walls and floor of their ruined shrine shivered around them as they retreated away from the water. The elder god's tentacles crackled with eldritch energy as they emerged from the lake and curled up and over their heads, forming a fleshy as well as magical prison. It took a moment for his befuddled brain to recognize the fact that the lapping waves were now at the same height as the floor they stood upon. Either the platform was sinking, or the level in the cavern was rising.

"I have had enough of these impossible delays. Since you will not choose for yourselves, I propose a forth avenue of destiny, one with neither Scion nor sword. Not as ideal perhaps as the empire I would have granted you, Kain, if only you had done my bidding, but acceptable for my purposes none-the-less."

More of the creature's thick tentacles slid to the surface of the water, tips reaching over the edge of the platform like a dozen giant fingers. Kain hissed as the powerful limbs suddenly tightened, exerting their concerted strength against the carved stones.

The floor began to crack and fissure in sweeps radiating from the center. The granite platform crushed beneath the cephalopod's grasping arms, the uncanny limbs raking the weakened stumps of the subterranean Pillars, and their surround into the lake. Water pooled up over the edges of the tilting slabs, forcing his younger-self to scramble to avoid being splashed as he fought for a safe perch amidst the chaos. Raziel fanned his wings, uncaring that he was standing in several inches of water, studying the barrier above them with grim intensity.

"Raziel! Kain wished his lieutenant would simply act on whatever idea he was meditating on as he danced backwards from a massive fracture in the marble beneath his feet. Half of the stone suddenly gave way with a wet gurgle, the slab sinking rapidly once torn free of the Pillars. Leaping to the relative safety of a remaining fragment, Kain grabbed hold of his younger self as the youth made to join him, steading the fledgling's landing.

"Time." Raziel suggested.

Kain blinked. "What?"

Only after he asked did he realize the statement wasn't meant for his benefit. He felt the throb of the Pillar's magic jolt through his bones, shattered and broken they might be, but something of their astral essence remained. The ghost of the pillar of the Time Guardians seemed to solidify in the weak sunlight, and everything around them slowed. Splashing water became spangled sheets of unmoving glass, falling debris hung in the air as if weightless. Event the so-called-god seemed to be caught in the geas, massive mottled green brown limbs caught, coiled in midair. The silence was almost painful by comparison to the frantic noise from moments before. The world had gone entirely still. Other than the sound of his, and his fledgling's breathing, there was nothing to move, to make noise, left in the world. He turned around him in awe, feeling entirely unaffected by the titanic feat of sorcery. The boy at his side cursed softly.

Raziel fanned his wings, motes of light gathering and breaking free from the tips of his feathers as he stood unmoved by the wonders around him. "Energy?" The vampire called softly, and the Pillar obeyed. The returning aura of the missing Pillar thrummed along Kain's spine, leaving him shivering reflexively. The crackle of raw power, ready and willing to heed his command, summer thunder, the smell of ozone after the lightening had struck, the low rumble of the herds' hooves as they raced across the plains and the rush of water down mighty chasms. Looking over, Kain met Raziel's eyes as his lieutenant glanced his direction. The questions he meant to ask died on his lips with that look. All mysteries seeming to find their answers in the calm confidence that the Soul Reaver exuded. It felt strange, to apply the title to the man, and not the blade, but also right. Raziel was the blade, and the blade was the man. Without being able to explain it, he felt the truth.

Glancing left and then right at their prison of tentacles, Raziel returned his look with one that was very nearly playful, seeming to dare him to guess what would come next. The answer was on the tip of his tongue.

"States." Raziel voiced the word at the same time as he did. And the ensuing ripple of magic nearly took him off his feet. The world rippled and flexed around them, transforming, changing. The water that had been until recently, threatening he and his young-counterpart with painful death, abruptly cooled and hardened into a thick slab of ice. Many of the tentacles were entombed beneath the rapid freeze, other were hopelessly trapped half in and half out of the lake, ice crystals forming along their exposed lengths. At the same time, the fleshy barrier over head seemed to waver and vaporize, ancient tentacles and magic dissolving into mist and air leaving nothing behind but cauterized stumps.

Looking up at the open sky above them, Raziel played his final trump. Calling to Nature as he crossed the platform to Kain's side. Roots of every size and shape imaginable seemed to ripple to life, crawling down the walls of their cavern, stabilizing the fragile sides of the sinkhole with their matted tangle. At the same time a fresh breeze seemed to arise from the very rock itself, leaving those caught in its way feeling strangely buoyant. Even the ice seemed brighter some how, the sunlight more clear, the stone steadier under foot. The world and all it's splendors was suddenly present making itself known in a thousand tiny ways. Raziel tucked a hand beneath the fledgling's shoulder guiding him to stand. Not waiting for the youth to critique, his lieutenant easily scooped him up in his arms and wings spread, vaulted upwards with the help of the willing zephyr. Kain blinked in amazement at how easy Raziel had made the magic look. Forgetting for a moment that he too would be best served by a quick exit.

A shiver from one of the gruesome tentacles half buried in the ice heralded the potent magic's fading power. Gravel clattered as it finally finished falling, clattering softly against the ice. Kain leapt to a convenient ledge half way up the wall, finding it an easy jump to another, slightly higher lip in the crumbling ruin. The sound of cracking ice was his only warning as the Elder god fought free of his restraints, reaching up after him with tattered looking coils. Kain laughed as he saw yet another ledge and teleported across the cavern to it. The squid was a moment slower, sucker-covered limb tearing down his previous perch with a wordless bellow of rage. Another tentacle was already snaking up along the side of his new shelf, but Kain could now see the surface, and did not wait to see what the pretender-god might do.

"No!" The monster complained angrily as he slipped out of its reach. Kain sighed in relief as his body reformed itself some ten yards from the crumbling Pillars' shrine, startling Raziel who happened to be looking his direction. The false-god's tentacles were not long enough seemingly, for the creature to do more than forlornly test the sides of its burrow, vainly hoping that something useful might still be in reach of its clutches. "Damn you, Kain! You have not won yet!"

"Nor have I lost." He smirked as he dusted himself off, pleased to have survived yet another attempted coup. Really he had Raziel to thank for that. Being rescued by his sword seemed to be becoming a habit of late. There were worse things, he supposed.

"Well. That was exciting." He couldn't resist the quip as he turned to examine how Raziel fared.

His lieutenant simply stared at him as if he was mad, more ragged and dusty than ever. The boy sprawled at his feet looked up at him with similar sentiments on his face. The three of them looked similarly disheveled, he decided, examining his own arms. No better than the Hylden wretches who had dug their way to the surface of the swamp.

There was no time for the nicety of bathing however. The sinkhole in front of the Pillars grew steadily wider for a few minutes as Nature's presence waned. Forcing them to draw back further still in an attempt to stay on stable ground. Kain shook his head at the mess. The scene went far beyond any he had ever encountered. The mystical monument was almost unrecognizable after their repeated abuse. He blinked as the stump of the Pillar of Conflict fell forwards, disappearing into the watery oubliette with a splash. There would be no founding an empire on the platform now. Kain mused. There was hardly any platform left. If he perched on the remains of the Pillar of Death, he might cast a baited line into the hole just in front of him and play at fishing for watery fiends.

"Please tell me that can be fixed?" Raziel asked. Glancing sideways, Kain wondered if the man was being rhetorical. A second Pillar rolled forwards into the growing pit as he tried to think of a reply, making him cringe again. This was not how the future was supposed to begin.

"I think it safe to say, that I am open to suggestions, child." He advised candidly as he felt the tremor of a distant earthquake, wondering if it was rude to offer to take bets on which portion of his legacy would be next to collapse into the Elder God's hovel. There were undoubtedly more productive things he could be doing with his time, but heaven only knew what they were.


	8. Chapter 8 The End's Ending

**Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King**

(A continuation fan-fiction for Legacy of Kain: Defiance)

/../- implies vampiric 'whisper' a.k.a. telepathy/mental projection.

The Soul Reaver isn't capable of speech as such, but I gave it dialog anyway to show that Kain can interpret its wordless snark without difficulty? I have no idea. Just go with it.

**The End: Chapter 8-**

There was something uncanny in the way the fog crept across the lowlands. Its slowly curling tendrils seemed almost hungry as they spilled through the river valleys and over the surface of the distant lake country. The whole of Nosgoth was gradually turning into a series of hill-top islands in a sea of churning grey. Kain pursed his lips as he watched the mist draw closer, seeming to close in on their sanctuary on all sides. At the same time as the ground was swallowed, the sky grew darker, a heavy cloudbank filling in overhead. The little left of the world he knew was akin to a wash of ink on a white canvas. The illusion of solid forest and rocky peaks protruded from the soft haze all around, leaving him to wonder what would happen when those too faded from view.

The feeling was uniquely claustrophobic, Kain found as he studied the phenomenon. Well above ground, and yet still miles before the lowering sky, he felt compressed, thwarted by the nothingness hemming him in both above and below.

Some silent impulse had goaded him to return to where he had begun. The ruined council-hall of the ancients was no different from how he had left it mere days before. Only he was altered by the recent turmoil, battered and confused and still no more certain of his course than he had been before. He looked around at the delicately carved thrones and mural bedecked walls, reminding himself of their reality.

Young Kain had settled himself on one of the massive chairs upon their arrival. In theory the youth was regaining his disquieted composure after surviving the rather unique experience of being borne aloft by Raziel's uncanny wings. Agreeable the boy might be now, but neither he nor his lieutenant had been comfortable with the idea of the fledgling following them to the tower under his own power. The chance of losing him again, after all the trouble they had just gone through on his account was simply too great.

Truly the pale vampire looked exhausted. Naturally thin faced, he didn't have the stamina yet to put up with their recent ordeals without something of the stress showing in his countenance. Dark rings under his eyes hinted that the child would do well with a meal and a rest before they tackled their next Herculean endeavor. Had he time or energy to be compassionate, the fledgling's resigned expression might have solicited him to at least make an effort for the youth. Sadly there was little hospitality to offer in their current aerie, and nowhere in particular that he felt was safe to transfer to, even if they wanted to.

To his credit, the handsome fledgling wasn't complaining. Instead he seemed content to just watch him in return, holding his own council for once as he watched events unfold. The boy had scarcely said two words since their escape from the pit, and the old monster it contained. Kain wondered what his younger-self was thinking.

"And in the softly tripping gasps of my lord's weakening breaths… I recognize too my own final passing. Come on to me o' harbinger of death. Though my knees quake with terror I will not deny thee. For life is 'ere shadow and fog, and all is ending…" Raziel recited softly under his breath, voice strangely resonant in the dead air.

Kain smiled humorlessly at the old soliloquy, remembering it well. Not one of his favorite poets perhaps, but his child deserved due credit for recalling such an apt verse for their current situation. Strange how readily the remainder of the speech came to tongue when it had been years beyond counting since he'd given it any thought. He neither could recollect the name of the author, nor even the age of the verse's composition, but the words remained nestled in his subconscious.

"Not for us now the crashing of arms, the trumpeting of furious battle. But instead the slow and crippling rush of time. Our voices once raised in grand and glorious host, now naught but ghostly whispers. Until at last in guilty hush, even those fade to silence." He quoted back at his favorite, turning to eye the dark haired vampire with grim amusement.

Raziel tilted his head in a wordless salute, acknowledging his recitation. His eldest had always been fond of the more morose poets, Kain suddenly recalled. Probably the author had been one of his child's clansmen. It wouldn't have surprised him.

The dark haired vampire rolled his shoulders and shuffled his feathered appendages as he shifted his weight. He was sitting on the throne at the center of the curved arrangement, the Seat of Balance, as it were, although not as the maker of the carved chair had probably intended. Balanced on one foot atop the overly tall backed stone throne, Raziel had one leg stretched negligently down the front of the furnishing, while sitting on the heel of the other folded beneath him. His toe-claws bit into the weathered ornamentation as he held himself on his unlikely perch. With wings to counter balance, he seemed quite comfortable with his place, and to his credit didn't look half as silly as Kain might have, should he have attempted a similar pose. If anything, it reminded him yet again of his lieutenant's raptor like nature. Raziel had always had a penchant for seeking out high places.

His alter-ego's mood might waiver between exhausted and curious, but Raziel silently burned. Done with shouting, his lieutenant seemed content to await his next revelation, or blunder, or both. He fidgeted however, unable to help himself. Kain almost smiled at the characteristic passion the vampire fought to contain. Given the command to fly, he had no doubt that his lieutenant would be in motion without so much as a drawn breath of delay. Just watching him made Kain itch to do something, to act on impulse and to hell with the consequence.

He folded his arms across his chest, ignoring the mystery unfolding over Nosgoth for a moment in order to pace a short circuit back and forth in front of the gathering of thrones. They were safe for now. And while things might seem grim, were grim, he was not entirely without the ability to consider the situation rationally. If only he could think! The world was entirely mute beyond the edge of their chamber, magnifying every little sound he could hear, and making them all the more distracting.

He found himself idly wishing his younger-self would kindly stop breathing so loudly that he could better organize his thoughts and ruthlessly checked himself before uttering the critique aloud. That way lay madness. Kain forced himself to settle, choosing a chair at the edge of the grouping and deliberately sitting in it.

A soft clatter of armor against stonework drew his eyes to his fledgling once again. The boy had made his own conclusions in regards to their next course of action, and had opted to take the opportunity to shed some of his burdensome gear. Kain morosely cast off yet another bit of the battered black armor, adding it to a growing pile of random plates next to his seat. Greaves, gauntlets, hauberk, guards and gendarmes were dispatched with. The vampire didn't stop until he was down to his padded jacket and leathers. The dirt caked coat was soon unlaced as well. His fledgling inspected it with a tired sigh before prosaically turning it inside out and scrubbing his face with the marginally cleaner inner lining.

It was discomfiting to note how the loss of the armored layers seemed to strip ten years and a hundred pounds off of the already frail looking youth. Kain was struck yet again at how much of a puppy the vampire he was dealing with really was. It was a wonder the vampire grasped anything at all of their current situation. It had to all be fantastically bizarre from the boy's perspective.

And yet the youth had survived thus far. Would survive far longer still. This was the Kain of prophesy, the one destined to restore the world to balance and rightness for once and for all. Someday this new Kain would evolve to look much as Raziel did now. Kain tried to imagine a more 'vampiric' winged version of himself, but couldn't manage better than a hazy guess. His thoughts drifted back to the murals buried deep in the basement of the Citadel beneath them. The ancient vampires hadn't had it so wrong after all, when they'd predicted their messiah. Better late than never?

His alter ego felt his examination and looked up, matching his gaze with an expression of resignation.

"Supposing I suggest to you that we set aside the small matter of which of us lives or dies for the moment?"

Kain snorted in agreement. "I am amenable to that. Your assistance in freeing me, below, was kindly done, Kain."

"Don't mistake self-interestedness for altruism." The youth waved aside his praise with a candid look. "What the hell was that thing?"

"Behold your oracle, child. Or at least, that's what the ancients called it." Kain let his head fall back against the cool surface of his throne, "Now ask me what it really is, and I will be compelled to admit that I know little more than you do on the subject."

Tilting his head to take in his younger-self's disgusted expression he then turned to where Raziel artfully crouched. Still cozy atop Balance's elaborate throne, the winged vampire met his look with a raised eyebrow. Kain couldn't help but find the familiar look endearing, despite himself. "I don't suppose you can enlighten us?"

"Call it what you like." Raziel smiled bitterly. "Elder God, Wheel of Fate, Eater of Death… it has many names, each more grandiose than the last."

Shaking out his wings, he looked out at the fading horizon with a brooding frown. "As to what it is? It is a parasite. For all its claims and pretty speeches, it is not the source of life for this world. As far as I've seen, it creates nothing. Provides no particular service. It benefits no one, save for itself. It simply consumes, forever eating and growing…"

"To what end?" The fledgling voiced the question that Kain was thinking. Folding his legs together, and tucking them underneath him in an enviable display of flexibility, the youth sought a more comfortable repose against the back of his oversized chair. "What does the fiend hope to achieve?"

"I cannot speak of more than vague suspicion." Raziel shook his head.

Kain felt a pang of disappointment in the silent confession. Not even his prodigal son knew the answer to that mystery. A pity. He'd been hoping the boy had been privy to the fiend's secrets. In the end, did it matter what the beast's intention was, so long as it was thwarted? But then, how was he to know what he was thwarting, if he didn't know what the monster sought to achieve? Certainly, it wanted him dead, that much was clear. Or if not dead, then otherwise crippled. It didn't want him and his Reaver acting in accord. A point in Raziel's favor it seemed. Regaining his ability to speak and act at will, had definitely seemed to throw the false-god off its stride.

"I suspect that in the end, consumption of all set before it may be its primary and only function." Raziel offered. "For it seems to delight in setting the natural order in disarray in a manner best guaranteed to create ample fodder for its appetite."

Young Kain made a sour face. "If that's truly the horror's ambition, it seems to have succeeded." The youth balled up his padded shirt between his restless hands, considering their situation. "All we've done is provide a few minutes worth of indigestion before the main course."

"This is very likely." Raziel sighed in agreement.

"I'm not yet inclined to give up." Kain mused aloud. "Between the three of us here, there may still be a way out of this morass."

His lieutenant gave him a morbidly curious look. The boy across from him favored him with outright disbelief. Kain gestured to the room at large, "Consider, both of you. This is not the first time that I've had the luxury of witnessing the end of the world. I've seen Nosgoth tumble to parched dust, be washed by floods, scorched by apocryphal fire, sink into dank misery by Hylden rule… each time there has been a chance, a moment of uncertainty, a way out." He folded his hands together as he spoke his thoughts of the past several minutes, the idea crystallizing for him even as he gave it voice. "The face that I am standing once again on the edge of the abyss is not what interests me in these events…"

"What then, old one, do you find so interesting in our present situation?" His younger self asked cynically, tossing his make-shift towel across the space between them.

Kain caught the rag, surprised at the simple courtesy. He took a moment to wipe his face and arms free of the worst of the grit he had picked up in their recent battle before passing it along to his lieutenant. "What interests me, Kain, is that this time, it isn't my , well, our fault. I didn't do this." He gestured to the fog enshrouded countryside. "I didn't see this ending coming."

"What difference does that make?" The pale youth blinked at him, non-pulsed. "Do you suppose yourself omniscient?"

Raziel simply frowned, elegant eyebrows furrowing as he considered the concept. Unlike the fledgling, his long-time lieutenant had a certain affinity for the interconnectedness of the various timelines they'd explored. Seeing that the vampire grasped at least something of what he was thinking, Kain addressed his favorite directly. "Consider, Raziel. Every apocalypse Nosgoth has faced has been the result of one, or the other of us failing into a trap of the beast's making."

"Whether you, or I, or both of us fail doesn't matter, the ending is always the same. The world inevitably fails with us, one way or another."

"Had you opted for death as a youth…" Raziel inferred thoughtfully. "The Pillars would have failed, the Hyden freed, and I would have been left behind to be claimed as 'Blight'… but… surely they'd have used me to kill the Elder God before damning the world to oblivion."

"No doubt our many-eyed adversary had a host of plans ready for Moebius and his pet humans to overthrow the demons before they could do the slightest harm." Kain supplied. "Likewise, if as a youth, I could be convinced to destroy or abandon the Reaver…"

"As you did in this Raziel's future?" His lieutenant asked archly.

He overlooked the goad in favor of continuing his narrative, "If I stupidly forsook the Soul Reaver due to the false-god's meddling, I'd have been a fine partridge for plucking at any point along the way. No amount of knowledge, or arcane power, would save a Scion who was not armed with the only means of the beast's undoing. I would have simply been its tool, first scouring the land of Saraphan, and then in turn, being defeated by its minions." Kain shook his head. "The world might last longer, and be a mite prettier, but it would still end just the same."

"Where as in our future, you neither chose death, nor set me aside, but instead cleaved to life and Reaver both. Neither of us wholesome or balanced alone, but neither of us precisely 'failed' either?" Raziel easily followed his reasoning, wings fanning wide as he considered the implications. "We hung in a limbo of our own making. Uniquely balanced in our imbalance for a millennia… until you killed me, of course."

"It was either you or I." Kain pointed out gently. "Did you think that your evolution would have stopped where it had, child, if I hadn't abbreviated your existence? You saw what became of Turel, did you not?"

"Yes." The dark haired vampire tilted his head, studying him with cool intensity. "You foresaw what I'd become? My final form?"

Kain smirked at the memory of what the time stream had shown him, and at Raziel's evident interest. Strange that the man had never considered it before? His lieutenant still had a few blind spots after all. "Our future was crawling towards an inevitable war between you and I. One from which neither we, nor Nosgoth would emerge." He shrugged. "Rather than wait for that purposeless finale, I chose to tip the balance deliberately, of my own will, in my own way."

"To best serve your own ends, you blithely cast me down to a fate worse than death." Raziel stated with patently false disinterestedness. The Soul Reaver flared in his grip with his repressed outrage. "I thank you kindly for that, Kain. Do not imagine that I forget it."

"I'd be very much surprised if you had." Kain sighed, not interested in a fruitless argument about the past. "It was not done blithely, but deliberately? Yes. I stand as I am accused. It was by no random chance you were killed."

"I cast you into the unknown, Raziel." He met his lieutenant's uncanny stare without flinching, seeing no reason to prevaricate. "Somehow it seemed to me, after all my researches, that you could do what I could not. I as Balance could not escape my fate, I was tethered to the Wheel's cycle just as surely as the humblest serf. Even my death was part and parcel of Moebius' plans. But you, child, you were a mystery. Your brothers, I could trace their destinies from beginning to end. Their origins, their human lives, their resurrection and even eventual defeats, all of it was an open book to me, thanks to the time streaming chamber's magic. But you were a different story. You who's origin and ending were one and the same. Where was the sense in that? It was then I realized the secret of what you were. A paradox. You couldn't exist. You shouldn't exist. And so I unmade you, to see what might happen."

Opening his hands in a gesture of wonder, he looked thoughtful up at his confounded lieutenant. "And just so… I discovered another secret. As you were never provably alive, death could hold no dominion over you."

Kain watched the dark haired vampire closely, wondering what Raziel made of it all. His favorite's mouth was pressed into thin line, biting back any outward expression of his thoughts. The vampire's body all but vibrated with the intensity of his displeasure however. Realizing that he'd never likely get a better chance to ask, Kain felt more than capable of braving one of his lieutenant's outburst in soliciting an answer to a question that had been puzzling him for the better part of a thousand years or more. "Where did you come from, Raziel? Do you remember?"

"Come from?" The winged vampire looked at him as if he'd gone mad. His mood shifted as he took on the new and unexpected inquiry. "What do you mean?"

"Who were you before you joined Moebius' service? Where were you born? What was your lineage?" Kain clarified, honestly curious. "No vampire remembers their life before… But you who have died and lived again, ought to be able to…"

Raziel frowned, perplexed, considering the question. "I don't know." He spoke at last. "I cannot even recollect for myself being Moebius' lapdog, Kain, which I well imagine I must have been, after encountering my past-self."

Flipping his wings in a gesture of unconscious anxiety he rubbed the back of his head with his free hand. "My first memory is as it always was, my resurrection. My last will undoubtedly be my re-investiture into the sword." He held the blade up, considering its serpentine length. "Perhaps I came from nowhere."

"It is a very real possibility." Kain mused softly. "Perhaps your very existence was brought about by one of Moebius' little intrigues."

"What. You're saying that he transformed me from sword to man just so that he could try and persuade me to undertake his cause instead of yours?" Raziel blinked and stared at him again, grimacing in disbelief. "That's a distinctly twisted notion, even for you, Kain."

"Is it?" He shrugged. "What better way to subvert a supposedly incorruptible force? To offer freedom of choice was to make you vulnerable to manipulation at the moment of your choosing. What better way to lessen your power?"

"That's macabre." Raziel shook his head. "That's too far fetched."

A snort of laughter distracted them from their dialog. Kain turned to note his younger-self was watching their argument with tired amusement. "The pair of you really do squabble like old hens, you know." The handsome fledgling pointed out.

"You'll do no better when your time comes." Raziel counseled morosely.

"Probably not." The fledgling agreed. "But for what it's worth, I'm with Kain in this. I don't claim to have the intimacy with the time-streamer that you both seem to feel, but from what little I gleaned from him, a crack-brained scheme for turning a sword into a man seems just the sort of thing that would inspire him."

"Kain has a point." Kain drawled idly. "You have to admit, Moebius and twisted plotting go hand in hand."

Raziel threw his head back and laughed, not exactly a happy sound. "God you're right. He never did anything by halves."

"Thought he was mad as a magpie, myself." The youth added darkly. "All that time-bending, it can't be good for a person's wits."

Exchanging a long look, Kain refused to be baited by his lieutenant's ironic expression. He had been mad before undertaking his prolonged walks through history via Mobieus' machine, it was doubtful the device had done him any further harm. Raziel simply shrugged at his silent rebuttal, smiling to himself as he let the comment go un-remarked upon.

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"Can I ask you a question?" The young Kain stared at Raziel thoughtfully, breaking a companionable silence of several minutes.

"You may." Raziel acknowledged the handsome vampire, turning on his perch to better study the youth.

Kain looked up, distracted from a return to his unpleasant reverie by the cordial exchange. Stripped of his armor and much of his pride, at least for the moment, his former-self rested his elbows on his knees as he waited with them for the end of the world. Sitting in the overly ornate throne of the old empire, Kain looked as though he belonged in the ancient citadel, more-so perhaps than either himself or Raziel did. Contemplation was a good look on the youth. A pity the boy didn't undertake the exercise more often. Then again, woolgathering was an old man's pursuit, so it was hardly surprising that the boy didn't have the knack for it quite yet.

"You truly are the Soul Reaver made flesh?" The fledgling gazed up at Raziel, not bothering to hide his fascinations with the vampire's wings.

"I am." The dark haired vampire agreed calmly.

"And this one, he is truly Kain, but from a different future than yours?"

"It's a trifle more complicated than that." Raziel shrugged, feathers shifting with the movement. "But for the sake of brevity, let us say that he and I… have a history."

The youth raised an eyebrow at the cryptic reply but didn't argue it. Kain was grudgingly impressed to see the sudden increase in maturity. Could it be that the boy simply needed to hear it from someone deemed 'impartial'? What an utter farce. That in the end, it would be Raziel who would talk some sense into the boy where he could not? Too fascinated by the dynamic between the two, he held his tongue and let the Reaver possessed vampire work his magic.

"Before, you were inclined to murder me. But then you saved my life from that… thing. Now you are all gentility, why the change?"

Raziel had to pause at that, clearly needing to run through the events leading up to his awakening with his own alter-ego. The winged vampire stared through the arched windows at the rolling clouds surrounding the tower as he held silent council with himself, smiling faintly at what had to be an interesting explanation from the vampire he had been that morning. Kain sorely wished he could be a fly on the wall of that dialog, but as both sides of the discussion were held inside his ally's thick skull, he was obliged to be content with reading his looks.

Raziel shook his head, grimly amused with his earlier antics. "It seems I must beg your pardon for that, Kain. Sins of the father should never be borne by the sons. Although in your case, it would be better to be said that you cannot be held accountable for your own future choices. When I nettled you at the shrine, I was more than a little convinced that you were inevitably to become a man I was not proud to know."

"And now you think that there is some hope for me after all?" Young Kain's face twisted briefly with annoyance. "I'm much obliged to you."

"Who's to say what it is that made you the way you were in the future? Who's to say what it will take to ensure you do not repeat those mistakes? Or contrive to make different ones, and end up like that surly bastard over there." Raziel gestured to where Kain stood.

He stared at his past self a moment and then looked askance at his lieutenant. Wondering whose side Raziel was on now. As impossibly contrary as his child could be? It was hard to say. The light was fading fast from the sky. Clouds gathering in dense grey rollers, as they blotted out any hint of sunlight.

"The beast. Back at the shrine. In the lake." Young Kain began again, slowly working through the revelations of the day. "It… Is it a god?"

His lieutenant fanned his massive wings, still entertained by their span, from the look of it. "I am inclined to believe it is an impostor. But then, not being god does not in any way mitigate the fact that it is powerful. It exists outside of our understanding of space and time. It may be that we have no hope of ever out maneuvering it. In that sense, yes, it could be said to be god-like."

"And the Hylden?" The fledgling asked, curious. "Where do they fit into all of this…? Do they serve this pretender-god?"

"I should think not." Kain chuckled darkly. "Nothing so simple, child. The Hylden have their own agenda, which is not entirely opposed to ours, in regards to the beast. Sadly, in all other ways their ambitions are antithetical to our cause and so they cannot be allowed to act unconstrained."

"The enemy of my enemy is still not my friend." The youth parodied the cliché cynically. "How inconvenient."

"Truly." Kain shrugged in agreement.

The wind picked up, ghosting through the old tower with a mournful lowing, bringing with it the misty scent of decay and damp. All eyes turned towards the broken balcony as they assessed the new development, but there was nothing much to see. Their view was shrinking steadily, the world contracting around their hiding place. The Pillars, or rather what was left of them, were slowly but surely engulfed, disappearing without a trace into the silent wall of shadow swallowing the land. It was beautiful in is way, but confusing as well.

Surely if the Pillars were the heart of the world, they would be the last to be absorbed? Looking at Raziel out of the corner of his eye, Kain couldn't help but feel, as much as see, the invisible radiation of power off of the vampire, off of the sword bound to him. The Soul Reaver shivered and burned in the muted light of the chamber. The unbelievably powerful paradox inherent in the sword maintaining their tiny corner of reality while all around them the world crumbled and fell?

He wondered whether it was a good thing that the sword sustained them, or not. Were they preserving the last hope for the world? Or were they simply the wrench in the gears as the universe sought to reset and repair the damage he and Moebius had wrought?

"We can't just stand here and do nothing." His fledgling-self voiced the obvious. "Surely one of you two has some plan by now?"

"I was supposed to be dead by now." Kain snorted.

Raziel gave him a dark look. "And I'm supposed to be a sword. What do you propose?" He gestured expansively. "Perhaps you'll rip my throat out, then walk into the fog and hope reality takes the hint and leaves the boy alone to finish the job for us?"

"Something like that." He grimaced; not liking the blunt way Raziel had interpreted his half-formulated-plan. "But it would be cleaner, and more to the point if we turned it the other way. The Reaver's edge would provide more certainty to me than the fog might. Better that I die explicitly then it to be left ill-defined. Once I am gone it would be a simple thing for you to absorb your future-self, would it not?"

"And what of Janos's heart?" The dark haired vampire looked askance at him. "Or had you forgotten?"

The youth stared back and forth between them, confused. "Janos Audron? What has his heart to do with anything?"

"It's yours." Kain replied absently, matching Raziel's glare with one of his own. "And no, I hadn't forgotten. But surely if the ancient was caught in this." He gestured at the mist. "That particular paradox is no more. Reality will adjust in such a way to ensure that only one heart remains."

"Insufferable." Raziel sighed.

"I have the Heart of Darkness?" Young Kain stood up, hand pressed to his chest as he looked down at himself in consternation. Turning to stare at Kain, the fledgling asked again. "We had the Heart all along? Those Saraphan fools turned the whole of Nosgoth upside down looking for it for two centuries, and it was in us the whole time?"

"Well, in you in at any rate." Kain raked his claws through his hair, forcing it into a vaguely tidy mass. Somewhere in his final skirmish with the Elder God the leather tie holding it back from his face had been lost, leaving it loose in the eddying breezes. Not for the first time since starting his cat-and-mouse game through time with Raziel, he wondered why he hadn't cut it in the past few centuries of waiting. It hadn't seemed to matter at the time, he supposed. But now the long strands were a terrible nuisance. "I've been doing without for a few days now."

The youth gave him a perplexed look but was smart enough to not pry further. Kain looked him over and found himself not entirely without hope. The boy was clear of corruption, and awakened to the Oracle's meddling, surely it was enough. What more could one heartless-old-vampire do? The only cure for youthful idiocy was time. He could hardly go holding the boy's hand for the next hundred years. Kain would have to make his own way in the world.

If Raziel would consent to return to his living prison in the sword, everything might yet resolve itself quite tidily. He felt the vampire's eyes on him, certain that his lieutenant could guess his thoughts. Raziel didn't seem well pleased. His lips twitched downwards as he read his look. "Martyrdom doesn't become you, old man."

"I thank you for your vote of confidence." Kain drawled. "It's either him or me. I believe we are all of us agreed? It needs to be me that goes."

"By all means, since you're volunteering." His fledgling agreed candidly, "The sooner the better, from the look of things."

"This feels…" Raziel shook his head. "I do not like being forced, Kain! First the false god, then Moebius, now you!" He beat his wings against the air in frustration. "What is it about your death in that always seems so horribly contrived? We're playing into their hands all over again. I can feel it in my bones. I will not allow it. Not after we've come so far."

"There is no they any more, child." Kain pointed out as the encroaching fog now lapping the base of the citadel. "There is no more Nosgoth, not for us. We stand on the brink of being cast out of the time-stream all together. Now is not the time to debate! Now is the time to act!"

"And yet I am still free." Raziel studied the Reaver bound to his hand with spectral fire, face grim. "The choice is still mine. I will be no man's slave. If I am to mortgage my soul for the rest of eternity for you, I'll do it on my terms."

"Raziel!" Kain protested as the dark haired vampire vaulted from his perch to land between him and the youth. Seeing the vampire raise his sword to strike, he left off his scolding and let his hands fall to his sides.

"Any last words?" Raziel cocked his head to the side, studying his face intently. "Anything at all?"

For a brief but silently humorous moment, Kain wondered what Raziel expected him to say. An apology? A declaration of some sort? Both were equally useless now. He simply shrugged, waving the vampire forward to complete what he had begun back at the underground shrine. Raziel sighed in annoyance at his silence. His alter-ego watched stone faced. God only knew what the fledgling would do in a century or two when he stumbled onto Raziel's grave. The warning he might have given the boy died on his lips. Kain was no fool. He'd realize that this timeline would have no bearing on his own once the temporal eddy was resolved.

"So be it then." His lieutenant acknowledged.

Kain blinked in stunned horror as Raziel reversed his grip on the blade mid strike, driving it backwards and into the fledgling's chest. The Soul Reaver twisted and sliced upwards like a bolt of living lightening, cleaving a monstrous wound through half the young vampire's chest and severing the tendon and bone of his neck as if they were made of paper and twigs. Raziel turned with his cut, free hand reaching into the remains of the gurgling vampire's chest to retrieve his accursed heart. Young Kain fell with a stunned expression, blood rapidly pooling around his broken body as it collapsed against the marble.

Staring down at the carnage he'd casually wrought. Raziel tilted his head in a genteel salute to the fallen. "Vae Victus, child."

"Raziel." Kain had to try twice to overcome his surprise. "What do you think you're doing?"

Witnessing the impossible ought to have become easier to cope with after the first few shocks Raziel had dealt him in the past day or two, but this final blow was entirely unexpected. Pausing to consider, he wondered, truly, why he was surprised. When had the boy ever listened to him sensibly in all of this? Why in heaven's name did he expect the vampire to start now? He forced himself to not grind his teeth at his favorite's latest lunacy.

The dark haired vampire considered first the bleeding heart in on hand, and then the serpentine length of the Soul Reaver in his other. Under his firm glare, the blood lingering on the sword's edge was sucked beneath the surface, absorbed into the ravenous light of the blade. Within moments the weapon burned as clean and bright as before, seeming all the more malicious with its slaked hunger. Chore done, Raziel humored him with a half-smile. "I should think it obvious, Kain. I'm choosing."

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Kain stood at a loss as his own history lay cooling on the floor. The youth's pale corpse was painted liberally in red, his shirt all but torn off his chest with the ferocity of the Reaver's blow. His neck and breastbone crushed beyond all recognition. Heartless, there would be no way for the vampire to recover from such a wound. He was well and truly dead. Unless the mystical organ was returned to him, and soon, his own history was now erased. Kain wasn't sure whether he wanted to laugh at the absurdity of Raziel's action, or just reach out and strangle the fool. For his part, his lieutenant seemed wholly unconcerned by his random act of murder. He was more interested in studying Janos' heart than the body he'd pulled it from.

"But this too, is a paradox." Raziel held the bleeding heart aloft, frowning as he watched it quiver, still very alive despite its lack of body. "What a strange marvel it is, this orphaned heart. Such a pity it cannot continue to exist."

"You've doomed us all, child." Kain tore his eyes away from the corpse of his youth to point out the simple fact. "You've unmade me. I no longer exist."

"You think?" Raziel tilted his head quizzically, mannerism more akin to his litch-self than anything his future-self might do. "I'm not yet convinced that is the case. You don't credit your own durability. I'm inclined to think this other one was merely an obstacle in our way."

"You don't mean that." Kain frowned. "There must be a 'Kain'! Who else can reestablish the vampire race! Who else will resurrect you and begin the inevitable cycle of the Reaver? Who else can restore the Pillars? All the other guardians are dead, child! The Pillars while tattered were not dissolved yet, not while the boy lived! If they fall now, the Hylden have won!"

"Won? Surely you exaggerate. The Hylden have won exactly the same as the rest of us, nothing. If the Pillars fall now, Nosgoth falls with them." Raziel gestured vaguely at the thick mist blanketing the world around their tower. "Look at it. It is dissolving. The barriers between life and death are all but vanished. The whole of the world is becoming nothing but spirit. Time, space, and dimension are all meaningless now. It's all one and the same. Is that what the Elder God has been hoping for, all this time? I wonder…"

"Use the heart and restore Kain!"

"Why? " Raziel snapped back. "Why must we waste precious time on a vampire who will need a millennium of practice in order to fully grasp the challenge he faces when we already have a Kain that suits our purpose?" Speaking in plural as his dual nature came to the fore, the winged vampire held the heart out of Kain's reach, as if expecting him to lunge for it.

"The Elder God must have known all along that we would be compelled to choose your earlier self." The winged vampire paced back and forth as he stated his case. Shirtless and wild-haired from their escapade underground, Raziel still seemed to glow with the energy contained within him. His fury and frustration were one and the same as the Reaver's fire.

Kain had the vague impression that the vampire would have grabbed his shoulders and shaken him, if only his hands weren't full. Raziel pivoted and stared at him, eyes alight with an inner realization.

"That is what it meant by crowing that it had already won! Don't you see? Choose the expected Kain, and one way or another, the monster would be the one picking the tune to which the world dance, as before!"

Raziel shook his head at the twisted logic of it. "Trying to coddle history into a new course and then stepping aside won't work, Kain. The minute you die, the damned squid will just wrench it all back the way it was, and everything will have been for nothing!"

Kain wondered if perhaps he was still a little mad. Some of what his lieutenant was raving about made a strange sort of sense. Had his favorite child truly seen the final layer to the ancient evil's trap? Or had they both lost what little was left of their grip in the face of the timeline's impossible tangle? He reached out a hand to catch Raziel's shoulder, halting the vampire's energetic pacing before it gave him a headache.

"I couldn't let that happen…" Raziel met his look with eyes burning golden bright. For good or ill he was confident in his rationalization. "So I, we, borrowed a page from your particular songbook and did the one thing the fiend couldn't have expected. I based my decision not on what made sense, or what ought to be, but purely on the merit of the contenders. I chose a Kain to serve. Not a perfect one, perhaps, but a far better example of one than thus far exhibited by any reality I've seen."

Staring at him as if he was stupid, the vampire sighed expressively. "You, Kain. You are the Scion of Balance, the Soul Reaver's master. You are the one I chose and none other. And god help me, when given the chance to change my mind, given another me to debate the choice with, I still chose you!"

"Janos' heart cannot restore me, child." Kain pointed out softly. "I'm as much of a paradox as the boy ever was, more so."

"I know." Raziel agreed, calm now that his point was made. He stared at the abortively pumping organ in his hand, weighting it against his palm with a considering look before setting it down on the seat of one of the ancient thrones. He wiped his bloody palm along the side of his battered leathers as he turned back to Kain to finish his thought. "No this spare heart is not the answer. It belongs to another, or shouldn't exist at all. You're perfectly right in saying it cannot restore you."

Raising a finger to clarify his plan, he smiled grimly. "But there is another heart here that might apply, and it is one that will not be missed."

"Whose?" He blinked, confused.

"Mine. Kain." Raziel raised his free hand, touching his breastbone thoughtfully. "Ours."

"No." Kain shook his head at the preposterous notion. "No that is impossible."

"Don't be so stubborn, you old fool." Raziel hissed, suddenly furious again. "You need a heart! You said it yourself! There is a heart here for the taking. A vampire heart, vital and strong, a heart capable of supporting even you."

"No."

The vampire shook his head, laughing softly but with little humor. "Here I am, offering you my heart, Kain, after all the misery and trouble you've put me through. And you say 'no'? You really are the most insufferable bastard in the world… Would it kill you to show a little gratitude for once?"

"I will not let you do this. I will not lose you again!"

"You've already lost me." Raziel pinned him with his uncanny stare, cynical smile twisting his lips. "Whether by water, by 'Reaver, or by simply vanishing into the ether as a temporal impossibility, I have already served you, Kain, and I have already fallen. This is simply another means to an already written end.

My future-self will never leave this moment, just as your fledgling there, will never leave this moment. This is the dead-end with which we shall trap the false god in order to beat him at his own game! This is the edge of the coin, Kain, the impossible possibility you sought! Best of all, since we will play within the confines of the continuum, the false-god can't stop us! From this moment forward there will be only one Kain…. And one Soul for the Reaver. The rest is just excess meat and wasted breath."

"No!"

"You're usually more eloquent." The vampire sighed wistfully. "As far as conversations go, our last is not shaping up to be particularly memorable. Do try a little harder, Kain. This may be the final time you ever speak to me…"

Pausing, Raziel grimaced as he considered the possibilities. "Unless of course, you fuck up your next future as badly as your last. In which case I suppose we'll meet here again; and again… And again."

Raziel folded his arms across his chest, grimly entertained. Striding to the edge of the nearest balcony, he stared downwards at the emptiness rising to meet them. The wind had risen to a gale while they'd ignored it, catching his thick dark hair and whipping it back against his skull, ruffling his feathers with the strength of its passage. Raziel half turned, staring back at him from over his shoulder. Once again Kain was struck silent by the rare beauty of the vampire's face.

He tried to place the feeling, but the words took time to find. It wasn't that he was afraid of his offspring. That'd never been a sentiment he was particularly guilty of. But there was something… awe, perhaps?

Kain wondered how it was possible that he was Scion and not the man standing before him. Beautiful, proud, absolutely assured, Raziel seemed to put him to shame simply by existing. The Soul Reaver, both flesh and steel, had become a beacon of light against the coming storm. Stranger still was how oblivious the vampire was to his own power, convinced that he still needed his approval, his acceptance. Did he genuinely believe that he was still the lesser being? Or was his deference simply out of habit?

"How may times have we done this already, do you think?" Raziel leaned against a battered section of stone railing, granting him a genuine smile for the first time since his awakening. The expression was a trifle weary.

"Is this truly the first time we've stood together in this place, Kain? Perhaps we have always stood here, making the same mistakes over and over, stumbling in a circle like drunks in a fog… Our never ending ordeal stretched out in an infinite series of mediocrity."

He shook his head in mock despair. "Already I find myself thinking even the apocalypse is a better alternative then being trapped like this forever."

Kain snorted with dark amusement at the thought. Their conversation didn't feel repetitive? He probed his memories carefully, but there was no help there. Nothing in what he recollected was accounted for in the detour the timeline had taken over the past several days. Maybe the Elder God was right. His memories were no longer going to realign themselves with the timeline because he had been excluded from it already. But if what Raziel presumed was true, he'd be able to rejoin that timeline in the young one's place.

The dark haired vampire crossed the distance between them as he meditated on the proposal. Raziel was standing at his shoulder before he really recognized his presence. The Reaver crackled in the vampire's fist, making Kain's skin itch with the potency of its aura.

"What will become of you, in all this?" He turned to his lieutenant, sensing the bindings of fate tightening around them the ripples of Raziel's choice echoing through their shattered reality.

"I will be… as I always have been." Raziel could not hold his stare for long, preferring to look towards the vanished horizon. Never as poker-faced as his brothers, the vampire wrestled a silent moment with his regrets. "Ah well." He turned back to Kain, and reaching up, clasped his shoulder, giving comfort when it ought to have been the other way round. "We do what we must."

For the second time in so many minutes, Kain stood astonished as Raziel did the unexpected. Sliding his hand from Kain's shoulder, his lieutenant unhesitatingly plunged it into his own body. His fingers took on a shadowlike aspect as they passed through his skin and bone without visible injury. The memory of his child's wraith performing just such an intrusion into hisown body made Kain grimace in sympathy. The 'in' hadn't been the problem. It was the 'out' that had proved excruciating.

It was no different for Raziel.

The Reaver flared brilliantly as the vampire doubled over, voicing a ragged shout as he tore free that which had no business being taken from a living body. His lieutenant sagged forward and down, knees giving way as he managed the impossible. Claws and fingers looked all together too real, as they broke through the skin and bone of his ribs, his heart clutched safely in his own palm.

Blood flowed freely down his stomach, mesmerizingly red in the pale half-light all around them. Panting in agony Raziel braced himself with the Soul Reaver, using it as a prop as he tried to stand.

Hissing in instinctive sympathy, Kain crouched next to his lieutenant, resolved that nothing was worth this grisly scene. Only the sword's magic, and Raziel's twinned soul, could allow such a drastic form of self-mutilation to be non-fatal. A normal vampire would have died instantaneously from such an injury. The command to his offspring, to put the abused organ back, to use his sword's strength to heal himself and forget the rest, died on the tip of his tongue. No longer needing to stand to complete his ugly work, Raziel simply concentrated his efforts on the logical step next step.

Any useful commentary Kain might have offered was forgotten in favor of swearing at the sudden and painful assault from his offspring. His lieutenant somehow found the strength to drive his clenched fist forward into Kain's ribs.

Knocked back, off his feet and against the wall just behind him, there was no resisting the sudden strike. Strength unbelievable, Raziel drove his hand into Kain's body as he had mere days before, reopening the earlier injury he'd sustained in order to deposit the very organ he'd been missing. For a moment Kain was granted the altogether unique sensation of arteries and vessels fusing together and then to his amazement, he felt the new muscle contract. His entire body pulsed with the heart's initial effort. After so many days of stillness, the motion in his veins felt uncomfortable, unfamiliar.

Kain gasped again as he felt his ribs suddenly ease back into their proper place. Raziel's hand and arm becoming spectral in appearance as he slowly withdrew his limb leaving behind nothing more terrible than the old scars Kain had always worn. The Reaver's fire was running down both of his lieutenant's arms now, a hint of it flickering within the terrible wound he had given himself.

For a silent eternity the dark haired vampire slouched forward, resting his head against Kain's shoulder, the pair of them too weak to move.

"Raziel…" He found his voice, little better than a whisper, and raised a shaking hand to support the vampire's shoulder. His tired fingers passed easily through the solid looking body pressed against his. Blinking, Kain found he could see the pattern of the ancient floor ties through the smoky grey mass of Raziel's wings. The vampire pulled away, staggering to his feet and back several paces as his body was surrounded with translucent blue fire. Raziel was but a shadow compared to the Reaver's ascendant glory.

"And thus I end…?" Raziel wondered aloud as his soul was drawn forth into the blade clutched in his hand. His body steadily lost first color, and then any pretense of solidity, as he sagged to his knees once again. The vampire's words were little more than a whisper weirdly distorted, as if spoken from miles away.

Kain couldn't help himself, reaching out in horror even as his companion became more specter than man. His limbs were slow to respond, body still partially numb from the injury Raziel had given him.

Beneath his healed ribcage, his new heart stuttered and skipped a beat as it settled gingerly into its second home. The tips of his claws easily passed through the fading remains of his lieutenant as the Soul Reaver finished its cruel work. "No, damn it. Not again."

"Woe to the conquered." Raziel's ironic whisper came to him in the instant before the broad length of the blade clattered to the ground.

Kain stared down at it in horrified fascination for a moment. The wrathful blue glow that had consumed his ally was still burning brightly in the skull's eye sockets. The whole blade seemed to burn brighter still. "Raziel?"

Mindful of his sore ribs, he sank to his knees and slowly reached out to claim the hilt. His questing hand was repulsed by a kinetic burst, and yet again he blinked as something both ethereal and familiar slipped free of his grasp. Spirit energy radiated out of the blade and formed a spectral cloud that just as quickly dispelled, whisked away on some astral breeze. For a minute he dared to hope that his lieutenant had won free of his fated prison, but looking down he saw that the blade it left behind was very much as it ever was. The Scion must have his weapon, and the Reaver must have its soul.

His second attempt to claim the weapon met with no interference. Kain sighed in relief to feel the familiar wrappings beneath his claws again. Even during the most distressing times, the Reaver blade had been his constant companion. It was oddly comforting, even given the recent events, to have it back in his hand again.

/ Raziel? /

He tested his blade with a thought. The outpouring of recognition/concern/regret from the soul trapped within was both immediate and powerful. Kain cursed himself even as he sighed in relief. Raziel was bound into his eternal prison, but otherwise unharmed by his outlandish plan.

Exhausted, Kain took stock of his surroundings. The lonely hall of thrones around him was just as it had been before. The wind tore through the broken panes of glass on the various balconies circling the chamber, howling through the holes in the walls. They sky beyond was leaden grey, tinged weirdly green as if heralding a summer cyclone. He stared dumbly at the odd color for a moment, before turning to take in his more immediate circumstances. Forgotten on a chair, Janos' heart still quivered with unlife, now of no use to anyone. Of Raziel's body there was nothing left. Only the Reaver remained. Kain propped himself against a convenient chair, and finding that he had no audience to impress, used its armrest to slowly pull himself to his feet. He felt every one of his years pressing down on him as he caught his breath. His chest ached fiercely where the Reaver, and Raziel's claws had done their cruelly necessary work. Rubbing at his scars gently, he was forced to concede that it had probably been the only way. Still, if given an opportunity for a repeat performance, he might just insist that the child give him a bit more warning.

Trying to imagine how a conversation of that nature would go. He shook his head and chuckled slightly. Lifting the sword so he could look it in the 'eye,' Kain smirked at his past and future ally. "That's twice you've cracked my ribs this month, child. I'm beginning to think you find it entertaining."

The sword flickered with what could only be described as playful malevolence.

"Yes, yes." Kain nodded and shifted himself so he could collapse into the chair properly, letting his head fall back against the carved surface as he inspected the gathering storm. "I suppose I deserved it."

Even with his eyes closed he could feel his firstborn's presence along his arm, warming and energizing him through the hilt of the Reaver blade. As galling as it was to have to sacrifice the handsome vampire a second time – or was this the third? – he was selfishly glad to have their private communion restored. "Your generosity, and your large-mindedness, Raziel, I have no way to thank you for. But let it be said, just the same. I could not have done this without you. Whatever comes, I will not forget that."

The ground shuddered beneath him as the streams and flows of time fought valiantly for a route through the madness of the day's events. Morbidly Kain tilted his head to consider the corpse forgotten nearby. How ironic that the body should have slipped his attention even for a minute, especially since it was his own. The somewhat vivisected remains of his younger self lay sprawled artistically where Raziel had let him fall. Young, arrogant, and in the end, more of an inconvenience than an ally; still, Kain wondered that he ought to feel something other than mild amusement at the thought of his own history cut short.

How the fates were going to unravel this particular puzzle was indeed a mystery, no matter what Raziel had speculated. Warmth curled up his arm from where he gripped the blade. His child offering what comfort he could in his current state.

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The air shuddered around him; the tower did the same. Kain blinked as the walks and ceiling crumbled and lifted away, seeming blown off by the powerful winds sweeping over him, save that the dissolution of the building happened with neither noise nor effort. Bricks and shingle seemed to come undone and float away as if by design rather than by the wrath of the storm. Given an unfettered view of the sky, he marveled at the swirling churning motion of the clouds. Not just greens, but blues, reds, and tawny yellows were hinted at in the maelstrom. The sky taking on a chaotic aspect as reality shifted to compensate for the changes being wrought.

Between one tremor and the next, Kain looked around and frowned, realizing that his other self had vanished. Not a bloodstain or a lock of hair from his younger self to signal his passing. The Heart of Darkness, likewise, had been swept away.

"And now the moment of truth." He mused. Pushing himself upright, Kain resolved to face his destiny standing, if for no other reason than that he didn't want to be caught lazing about on his ass if the world was truly coming to an end.

"What now?" He shouted at the air at large, one hand still pressed to his chest, still surprised to feel a heart beating where nothing had stirred for days.

"We cannot go back to the way things were, I've cut off that pathetic narrative once and for all!" Challenging the sky was not one of his more rational moments, but it was satisfying just the same. Strangely, he got the impression that the storm was listening. Drawing breath, he found his voice stronger when he continued.

"Which way will we turn now? Once more ground under the rim of the accursed wheel?! I stand fast! Let the wheel be broken!" He drove the Soul Reaver point-down into the dusty soil. It flared brightly at the gesture, seemingly as defiant as he was, if less vocal in its displeasure.

From windy maelstrom to absolute stillness; Kain stood suddenly in a vast silence. The hair on the back of his neck prickled at the sensation of energy gathering above and around him. What little was left of the world looked bent and distorted, as if seen through a thick and warped glass pane. The ancient thrones resembled pieces of bizarre artwork, twisted and stretched into impossible shapes. The floor bent and rippled when looked at out of the corner of his eyes like the surface of the sea done over in tiles. Lost was any sense of height or distance.

He looked past the edge of what had once been a balcony and saw only grayness, a sea of nothing lapping at his tiny domain. The solitary feeling left him grimacing in anticipation.

But there was no confrontation.

Indeed, he wondered, whether there was anyone still existing whom he could confront.

How could one fight against reality itself? He peered through the murky blur around him, habit more than anything making him seek out the familiar shafts of the Pillars. For a timeless moment there was nothing but darkness on the horizon. Kain squinted, and despite himself, prayed.

"All I wanted was for there to be balance."

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The breath that the world had seemingly been holding was exhaled in burst of spiritual enlightenment. Kain felt it, not so much on his skin, but beneath it. The machinery of entropy, the inevitable slide into nothingness, was slowing to a halt around him. He closed his eyes as the blinding feeling of power swept over him, and upon opening them again, found himself standing on familiar ground.

Underfoot was what remained of the platform from which the Pillars had stretched up and down, from the root to the crown of the world. He grinned to see that there was no gaping hole this time, no evidence of his recent battle with the elder god at all. The carved runes and inlay on the shrine's floor were unmarked by time or corruption, but rather looked fresh-made. Only their colors were off, the whole of the world suffering from the same washed-out looking grey hue.

The Pillars themselves were as insubstantial as the rest of the world, shadowy mirages of their former selves cast in phantasmal white. Without having to be told Kain found himself certain in the knowledge that it was his choice, whether they returned in their glory, or if they, and the rest of the world, vanished from all existence. Such had been the magic woven into the magical edifice that they and the whole of Nosgoth were forever bound together, the one with the other.

Kain turned slowly in place, studying the misty shadows beyond the edge of his modest periphery. There were consequences, which ever route he chose. He could feel the build up of time, of fate, swelling behind him with every breath, like the river he had always compared it to. His will was the dam stopping the flow. Once the choice was made there would be no regaining control over the torrent. At his side Raziel's sword shivered in his hand.

"Is it truly, my choice?" Kain whispered to himself, astounded. "As simple as that?" Answered by the absolute silence around him, he exhaled in soft amusement. It seemed anticlimactic, some how. "Very well."

Raising his arms in benediction, he performed for himself, for lack of a better audience. "Let there be light."

The Pillar of Balance incandesced out of the blurry background, white and pure, a brilliant anchor to cling to when surrounded by chaos. Kain smiled as the other Pillars acceded to his will, resonating with their fulcrum as they redefined the foundation of the world. Far more than just a magical prison for the unwilling Hylden, the Pillars contained the essence of Nosgoth, what had once been a grand geas for taping into those reality-defining forces for military gain would now be used to restore the world from the brink of nothingness. From their deep-rooted constancy, the rest of Nosgoth took form once more.

The Pillars of Dimension, Energy and Time took shape first. The triad wove together form and structure from chaos, defining what was, and what wasn't, and what could be. The Pillar of Nature returned from darkness in a wave of green and gold, blue and brown. What was formed was given life, and the life had a newness and freshness to it that Kain had never dared to hope for. Like a shadow into the light, the pillar of Death sang its melancholy song in counterpoint to Nature's fanfare, subtly shading the innocence of rebirth with a certain world-weary grace and lassitude. Far from being upset at the implied mortality of his creation, Kain nodded acceptance at the darkness, recognizing it for what it was, a necessary part of life.

His eyes then turned towards the Pillars of Conflict and States. What was a world after all, without the various creatures to inhabit and make use of it? Everything evolving, changing, transforming from one moment to the next, survival demanded such energies, well checked by the more benign forces of the dominant Pillars. From the twin beacons of light, came the muted echoes of men and beasts restored to life. The distant chorus of shouts and cheers grew as the people of Nosgoth rediscovered themselves, not sure of what had just befallen them but aware of some great event having taken place. Kain ignored them for a moment in favor of considering the final Pillar.

Mind awakened slowly, almost as if embarrassed at having caused the chaos in the first place. He chided it gently – as if scolding a reluctant child – and it grew in strength. With its final awakening came a more-complete sense of self-realization than he had ever thought possible.

Kain considered his position at the center of the world, and for a moment of absolute clarity, could see every possible outcome of his every choice. The infinite variety presented him was both overwhelming and deeply satisfying. With the Pillar of the Mind's help, he very quickly narrowed the multitude of paths down to one general direction, a way forward for the world, and for himself, but he hesitated on making the final choice.

There were always consequences.

The Soul Reaver shuddered again at his side, as if feeling his worry, and in looking down at it, Kain found himself asking the Pillars for more alternatives.

It was true, the Wheel could be broken, fate forever undone. The option was in front of him. All he had to do was take it. Nosgoth would never again walk a predestined path, his life, and the lives of all, would be free of constraint.

But the price?

Kain winced, finding it unpalatable. Certainly the beastly parasite, and the Hylden would be swept from the board, but so too would the Pillars, their geas unraveled and undone. Also, there was Raziel to consider. A world where the Soul Reaver had always been a blade, never a man? He saw without wanting to, how it would come to pass.

Raziel being written out of existence as an inconvenient paradox, never having had been, never to be again.

Kain rubbed his chest habitually, it would be a world where he wouldn't have had a need for the gifted heart, or time streaming, or lieutenants. He foresaw a utopia in the truest sense of the word, a place where everything was perfectly balanced. In such an idealistic place, what possible use could there be for a Kain? He couldn't fathom it. Grimly he foresaw being bored to tears within a matter of months. Perhaps there was such a thing as too much perfection?

"No." He murmured to himself as he sought a different tactic. "No there has to be an alternative that isn't completely intolerable."

Shuttling through alternatives with the help of the Pillars, Kain began to explore trade-offs that he could and couldn't accept. The Wheel would turn at least one more time it seemed, before he could declare his final and utter victory. This time however, it would spin on a course of Kain's making.

In order to assure himself of Vorador and Janos as allies, he accepted that he would be saddled with Sebastian and the others. In order to guarantee the Hylden were marginally contained, he resigned himself to the lingering irritation of the so-called 'elder god' beneath the skin of the world. Eliminating Moebius from the skein of history was possible, but the wars themselves could only be muted, not done away with. He foresaw the raising of his lieutenants, Raziel in particular, and considered it a more than fair trade.

Of course, raising his first born anew meant that a paradox would be yet again formed. He glanced down at the sword, and then back into the paths that Time and Mind had laid out for his inspection.

Raziel reborn would indeed be a paradox, one that could not last, if he ever planned to break free of destiny. One revolution of the Wheel would turn, marked by the span of his firstborn's life. No matter what he tried to offer in exchange, Kain could find no way of stopping the inevitable cycle. A Raziel raised to serve him must in turn be a Raziel condemned to return to this moment, to infuse the Reaver for Kain's future victory. He gritted his teeth at the irony of it. The one thing he wanted most of all, was impossible. Free will and Raziel at his side. He could have one, but never both?

"Damn you child, why must you always make things so difficult." He glared down at the sword in his fist. The blade flickered uncomprehendingly.

Time was running out. Kain could feel the forces building along his spine, Time and Death, States and Energy all tied to the Wheel of Fate, wanting to move again beneath his feet. The world was fighting to start its lumbering course down the path he had all but chosen.

"There must be some way!" He argued with the Pillars around him. Balance pulsed once, regretfully. The Pillar of the Mind blanked out all but the one path into the future.

The Pillar of Time flared to get his attention. Staring at it he almost smiled. In its brilliant light he saw the flickering of a thousand years of history, all to come. Fuzzy in places, crystal clear in others, Kain witnessed war, peace, the founding of his empire as it should have been. Raziel stood where he always had, at his lord's side, looking as confident and beautiful as his alternate self had only moments ago. Time accelerated and Kain could not look away. Raziel was gone in a blur; the how and why unseen. At least it wasn't the lake again. He didn't want to consider whether he'd have the stomach to sacrifice his first born to the ancient parasite a second time.

He watched himself standing alone as the final paradox resolved a thousand years in the future; fate and destiny broken once and for all. And then… the Pillar of Time seemed to imply.

"And then what?" Kain asked bitterly.

The future. Came the surprisingly pithy reply.

The great unknown spread out before him, a time when all predictions had to stop, when all oracles went blind. It was impossible to say that he would never see Raziel again, after the child's sacrifice. It was impossible that any thing would or wouldn't occur. That was the whole point of the exercise, after all.

Free will.

Surely if he wished to see his first born again, he would find a way to make it happen in that far distant future where anything was possible? The grain of hope offered was pathetically small, but Kain was no stranger to that. He took what was offered with what grace remained him and in an exhaled breath, let the moment of divinity slip away.

Once again he was surrounded by a blur, but this time the sense of motion was both inside and out. His thoughts and memories re-aligning to take on revised parameters as the world shuddered and shifted, adapting to its new continuum.

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Opening his eyes, he found himself in front of a set of Pillars as real and concrete as they ever were; the Reaver blade a muted presence in his grip.

He was Kain, the only Kain there ever was.

The fact that he knew that there had been a younger version of himself running around this morning was immaterial. From now on, he would take up his previous life, filling the gap Raziel had so thoughtfully carved out for him. It meant reliving quite a bit of what he had already done, and doubtless some explaining of his altered appearance to those few who he had called friends in his early years. But he felt optimistic that in this new and renewed Nosgoth there would be at least some novelty in the repetition.

If nothing else, there was Raziel to look forwards to, even if he would be obliged to wait a hundred years before resurrecting the knight and his Saraphan brothers.

In the mean time he would just have to amuse himself by putting down the minor irritation of the Hylden and any plots that the ancient squid might concoct. It would have to suffice to keep him entertained while he waited.

The sound of massive wings beating against the air interrupted Kain's otherwise pastoral musings. Glancing up he smirked at the odd shaped shadow coming over the trees. Janos Audron had succeeded in his modest quest, his erstwhile child well in hand, dangling from his arms like a truant green puppy as the ancient vampire glided over the trees. He raised a hand to hail them both as Janos circled in to land, setting his offspring down and coming to his own feet a few yards later.

"It is done?" The ancient wasted no time in coming up to him, anxious and pleased all at once. "We have been redeemed? Kain, I had so hoped, after so long, finally there can be peace. Innocence restored."

"Almost." Kain agreed, nodding at Vorador as the perplexed vampire joined his maker in front of the Pillars.

"Almost?!" Janos gave him a worried look.

Vorador frowned, studying him carefully. "I know you, vampire. And yet I do not."

"I am Kain, old one." He couldn't help but grin at the old bastard's confused expression. He'd forgotten how delightfully soberminded the old vampire could be. "You'll remember, it wasn't that long ago. I invited myself to your mansion and you lectured me at considerable length on etiquette and social obligation. You see me now as the Scion of Balance, which, whether you believe it or not, was as much a surprise to me as it is for you."

Vorador drew back in shock, staring hard at him. "The Kain I know is barely a fledgling, an arrogant little ankle biter with some delusions of grandeur. He had some potential, I grant you, but considerable growing up, and wising up to do before I would ever…"

"I would hope that I have done both, since we've last spoken." Kain smirked, unable to not antagonize his old mentor after so many years of not having the pleasure. "Several thousand years' worth, all totaled. I trust you will do me the honor of not fearing for the safety of your ankles anymore."

"What do you mean 'almost'?!" Janos desperately tried to get back to the topic of immediate interest.

Kain shrugged. "I could not undo all the problems of our world in one fell swoop. Not and have Nosgoth be at all recognizable when I was done with it. So I was obliged to take a partial resolution for the moment."

"But the Hylden!" Janos cried. "At least tell me the Hylden are contained? The Pillars are intact…"

"The Pillar of Dimension has the capacity to hold them at bay for a little while longer." Kain made a show of inspecting the edge of the Soul Reaver for signs of damage. It seemed to silently laugh with him, sharing his sudden joy at being alive, despite the ordeals to come. "But in the end I think at least one more war will be required to put an end to things, one way or another. Either they will come to accept their banishment and stop pressing the issue, or we will reduce their numbers to the point where banishment will be irrelevant. I am not overly concerned. After the Saraphan armies these mad creatures ought to be tedious but simple to deal with."

"So tell me, Kain." Vorador drawled. "What exactly have you managed to accomplish? For a our so-called savior, you seem so far to have done a somewhat half-assed job."

Kain looked askance at the surly vampire. "We're still here, aren't we?" He smirked at Vorador's long face. "As for the rest, just wait and see. I don't think you'll be disappointed."

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End of Book 1 of Once and Future King

(Stay tuned for book 2! 'The Beginning')


	9. Chapter 9 The Beginning

**Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King **

AU/continuatio- fic of Defiance (long live Tony Jay in our memories. Elder God, ye shall be missed)

- thanks to everyone for the long wait. I have dithered unbearably with where I wanted to start this part of the story, but heck. This is a Kain story, why not with some snark?

**The Beginning - Prologue**

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There were some days when the simple routine of living made it easy to forget that he had done it all before.

Kain rested a minute against the thick oak door and ignored the murmuring conversation taking place on the other side. Meridian's customary low fog rolled along the narrow alleyways of the dock district. The scent of dank decay and the salty tang of the tide crept even into the landwards side of town thanks to the heavy air. Short cloudbursts added to the general atmosphere of misery. The cold trickles of drizzle weren't strong enough to clear the fog, but still flowed sufficiently to saturate the blanket of filth on the streets. Mud churned up with the aid of pedestrians and carts throughout the evening, leaving the lane a treacherous mire for the inattentive.

It was not a hospitable night for vampires or humans caught out in it. Kain settled his overcoat a bit higher on his shoulders, not minding the damp, and enjoyed a rare bit of peace and quiet. How many times before had he observed such an evening on the streets of the city? In how many different futures? The repetition didn't bear thinking about. If he started to ponder how his every step, breath, word - probably every kill - was all an echo of a previous one, the result was more than a little maddening.

Ironically Kain existed with a sublime awareness that he was perfectly sane in an otherwise lunatic world. It provided him a measure of comfort on days when the past was especially exhausting to bear. It also made him wonder, how much the change within himself would cause inevitable repercussions in future, no matter his attempts to 'act the part' when occasion demanded it. It was all well and good to take on the roll of his fledgling self, but in his heart he just couldn't muster the energy to keep up with the bloodthirsty megalomaniac tendencies of his youth. It was not only his appearance that no longer tallied with what should have been.

He was an old vampire reliving a young age. It was a poor fit at best. The pure rage that had driven him for so much of his so-called-youth had long ago been channeled in more useful directions. Likewise the willful blindness and arrogance that had once been his besetting-sins, had also fallen mostly by the wayside after several millennia of study and self-reflection. Kain couldn't claim the man he had become was 'good', but at least he was better than the spoilt dolt he used to be. He figured that had to be worth something in the long run.

Still, Kain did his best to remain true to the past he remembered. It wasn't that much of a stretch. What would have once infuriated was still irritating. And no matter how much calmer his blood had become over the years, crushing a deserving bit of trash was still satisfying. Some things he just couldn't help, however. He couldn't stop himself from thinking, from acting instinctively, from being aware. Having the chance to do it all again, he was amazed by how obvious some of his mistakes had been. Despite all good intentions he just couldn't bring himself to repeat every failure when the proper course was so blindingly clear.

It was a worrying trend. Too many changes, even small ones, and the future would shift away from the one he remembered, and perhaps his opportunity to save the world would shift with it. He could no longer blindly assume that history would self-correct around his actions. He was as much a free agent now as ever Raziel had once been. A maddening conundrum; to balance himself between those choices he could to live with in the 'present' against those actions he needed to repeat in order to steer himself towards his meeting with destiny. Like walking a rope bridge across a crevasse, the task was arduous and slow; leaving him unwanted time to have second thoughts.

Kain sank deeper into the shadows of the doorway as a cart clopped past his lounging spot, not interested in exchanging greetings with the driver. Wraped in several layers of oilskin and cloak, hat pulled low over his head, the tired human didn't even see him. Man and beast both kept their heads down, focused on their weary trek. A lonely night for deliveries, he speculated as he watched the wet figure retreating. It was an unexceptionally miserable night in general save that he was out in it, camping as it were.

His front door was sheltered from the cold drizzle by a worn-down but serviceable overhang. But there was no place to sit. He wondered that he had never noticed sooner. If he had had any of the foresight he claimed to, he would have ordered a bench and expanded his humble entryway last year; but he hadn't, the thought has completely slipped his mind. And so the best he could do was lean against the doorjamb and wait for the appropriate moment. Some 'oracle' he had turned out to be. Kain couldn't help but laugh quietly to himself at his unlikely role in the cabal.

At times, being constantly aware of the shadow of the future had its benefits. There was a dark entertainment value, a quietly vindictive joy that he couldn't entirely disavow, in being able to say "I told you so" as frequently and certainly as he now could. Even with his constant worrying about changes, it seemed some events and people were too pivotal for things to alter much from one timeline to the next.

Tonight, for example, he had high hopes of overhearing something of value if he stood in front of his own house. History had not disappointed him. A millennia ago he would not have bothered to tarry outdoors on such an inhospitable night. The sewers were only steps away, and Vorador's safe house, or the taverns, made for interesting ways to while away the damp hours.

Digging through his memories, Kain couldn't recall having any particular agenda on this night. It hadn't been very memorable, what ever he had done. The only thing that mattered was that he had gone out, and come back late. Perhaps Magnus had been with him? No he had sent the earnest vampire off on a mission to Willhelm, hadn't he? Whatever the reason, he had returned home at dawn, alone, and gone to sleep. The following morning half the city guard had attacked and nearly burned him in his bed.

That had been a singularly unpleasant close call, and had signaled the ending of amicable relations with both Meridian at large, and his first crop of children specifically. Of course he hadn't known at the time whom had been responsible. _That_ information had come much later. Deduction had led him to realize that it was tonight, and here of all places, that things had truly begun. Satisfying curiosity was one of the few perks his prolonged reiteration through history could grant him, and he was inclined to make the most of it.

Kain tilted his head back against the wood, easily picking up the thread of the longwinded conversation happening behind him. The three vampires were finally coming to the point of their little assignation. Sebastian's words were the easiest to pick out, but he could sense Faustus and Marcus, even when they remained silent. Sebastian was off and rolling, complaining bitterly of the injustices he felt he suffered. Lord but the child did love the sound of his own voice. Jaded he might be, but to hear his eldest discussing his betrayal to the holy knights of the city in his own front hall was vaguely impressive. Kain hadn't thought the former-nobleman had the balls for it. The betrayal of course, was old news, but he was pleased to note that it was happening just as scheduled. It would have been depressing to learn that he had been feeding months of false information to the young vampire just to have Sebastian turn out to be faithful this time around. Smirking he considered the outcome of his 'change' to the continuum. Sebastian-the-traitor was an expected and necessary sacrifice to the wheel of fate. Sebastian-the-laughingstock, as surely he would become when his new allies realized he knew nothing of the real vampire plans? That was something of a bonus.

More murmuring, and now they seemed pretty much resolved amongst themselves. Faustus was as usual, blithely agreeing with what his elder brother was preaching. Always more for action than thought, the red-clad vampire was a natural born yes-man. Marcus, also true to form, was whimpering a little in his protests, but in the end he was no more loyal than the others, and soon changed his tune once assured all was safe. The only difference between this time and last was that their plotting was strictly against him.

Of Magnus, not a word was uttered. Hardly surprising given that the vampire didn't exist in this timeline. What would the stoic have made of this infantile rebellion? It seemed he was destined to never know.

Kain tutted quietly to himself as his remaining children's plans were finalized. He had always been faintly curious to know whether Marcus had ever held out in favor of him or had been in the plot from the beginning. Not that it mattered in the end, but he had his answer. They were self-serving wretches to a man. They and every last pompously self-righteous Saraphan priest on the continent would be found and piked like they richly deserved. Looking forward to the upcoming war was one of the few things that had made living through the last decade at all tolerable.

Pondering his options, Kain realized he would soon have to either slip away, or confront the trio. He could hardly pass them on the stoop. They weren't even supposed to be here tonight, they would wonder at his lack of curiosity, maybe even call off the raid they were supposed to be insulting him with tomorrow morning. The memory of his meeting with them the following evening, himself scorched and angry, them full of kindly concern and offers of assistance, made his claws itch for violence. At the time he hadn't known whom to blame for his Saraphan-inspired homelessness, and had been grateful for their aid as he and Vorador had begun preparations for open war. He'd never guessed that three out of four, now three out of three, were up to until it was far too late.

But in this continuum the Pillars were strong and whole. The Hylden were contained for a few years yet at least. Thus there was no Saraphan Lord with unearthly powers, no Nexus Stone of origins unknown. So did it honestly matter whether their betrayal was revealed now instead of in a year's time? He weighed histories and his own mood, and could find no pivotal events that would be affected either way.

It was for the best. Kain cracked his knuckles in preparation for some mischief. Arrogance was all well and good, but tastelessness and insipid stupidity were unforgivable. If he _was_ to be betrayed and drawn into a supposedly 'surprise war,' then history be damned, he'd do it on his own terms. It wasn't like things could hold forever to the history he remembered. One child more or less, one battle's opening gambit altered, did it really matter? Events would have to change. His future Raziel had told him so. The Hylden would have to be allowed out sooner-than-later. It was with them directly that his real battles for the Empire would be fought, not the shadow of Mobius' human campaign or any Hylden-possessed church lackey.

Besides, Sebastian's oily tone always set his teeth on edge; and just once, he wanted to be able to really speak his mind to the little backstabber. In the past-futures, the vampire had always ended up dead one way or another before they could have a proper heart to heart.

Shouldering the door open in an abrupt jolt, Kain smirked to see the dumbfounded looks on his lieutenants' faces. Once again he vowed to himself to never recruit from nobility on the assumption that they were any better suited to rule as vampires than anyone else. This lot, even on his second attempt, were little better than avaricious wastrels. Sighing mightily at his youthful folly, he folded his arms across his chest.

"So. This is how you thank me for elevating you? With disloyalty and lies…"

His gentle remark did little to dispel the horrified silence in the hall. It took a physical effort to not burst out laughing at their stupidly cow-like expressions. Even Sebastian was caught flat-footed, the usually cunning fledgling looking around the room nervously as if expecting more nasty surprises to leap out of the shadows. The urge to kill them all and be done with it was ignorable for the moment. He smirked at the disappointment Sebastian had to be feeling.

Catching the dark haired nobleman's eye he was forcibly reminded that this first-born wasn't a patch on Raziel. Callow and spineless, the best thing the vampire had going for him was a bit of refinement and political savvy. Not enough, however, to realize his grave misalignment of loyalties. Kain crossed the room, still ignoring the general stunned silence that his arrival heralded, and settled in his favorite chair. Assembled from several massive logs of carved oak, it wasn't gilded but was unmistakably throne-like in nature. It was comfortable as well, something else he'd learned to look for in the trappings of his daily life.

He lacked the patience he'd once possessed for constricting fashions and fine-looking-but-poorly constructed furniture. The only thing keeping him from tearing down the decadent, and dust-attracting, curtains hanging at regular intervals in his present home was the thought of Vorador's horrified expression to find him living even more spartanly than normal, and the annoyance the resulting sunlight might cause his occasional night-loving visitors. Still, his chair suited both his vanity, and his spine. He was somewhat sad to have to say goodbye to it, but smuggling it out of the soon-to-be-burned apartment would hardly be subtle. The whole point of the upcoming exercise was to be 'surprised' after all. Packing his worldly goods and freighting them across town the night before his home was invaded could only raise eyebrows.

Tapping his claws idly on the worn wood of his armrests, he considered his near-groveling audience. "I suppose I should remark on being surprised at finding you here. That would be the usual thing."

"You are…" Faustus was as usual the first to speak, even when he had nothing to say.

"Yes." Kain cut him off before he could start to mindlessly babble. Leaning forward to glare the vampire down he hissed, "I _am_. Scion, oracle, vampire lord, I am the reason why you are here, I am the reason that you _exist_. Although it seems you have forgotten. What else is there? What did you think was more important than that?"

"We just wanted-" Sebastian was quick to find a pleasing lie, attempting to defuse the situation, but Kain was quicker.

"Did you honestly think _your_ wants every played any part in my plans? Did you think I would hesitate to rip every last bone from your body without compunction should you ever do anything to displease me? No. Clearly you thought me too soft, or perhaps too stupid. You've forgotten that each of you lives only at my sufferance." Steepling his fingers in front of his chest, Kain had to admit it was satisfying, if cruel, to crush his lazy children for sport. "Your betrayal shows a distinct lack of mental and moral fortitude."

"Moral fortitude?!" His eldest clearly took that barb to heart. The vampire was almost bristling with outrage as he sputtered, attempting to counter the highhanded accusations. "Who are you to speak to us about morality, Kain? You are nothing but a petty and bloodthirsty tyrant! Not even a tyrant! You rule over nothing! A tumble-down apartment next to the docks and a few sewer rats? A fine kingdom! Which you are obliged to share with the old fool by the highway, I might add. Morality- I declare! You could no more provide moral guidance than you could control the _weather_ you old fool. And I for one am sick to death of being your un-respected and unwilling serf!"

Kain let Sebastian roll on without comment. The child seemed to be in fine form and he didn't want to ruin his speech too soon. Shouting was cathartic to the young, he had once been told. Still it didn't mean he had to listen. Tuning out boring conversations was easy after a few years of practice.

He mulled over the young vampire's outraged dare instead. He could lecture on morality with the finest, he was certain, but _could_ he control the weather? It was an interesting proposition. With the Pillars whole and unified in obedience to his will, it was theoretically possible that he could effect such a change on the world. The thought had simply never occurred to him before. It seemed a useful talent to have, especially on dreary nights like this one.

Still ignoring the babble from his accuser, he sent his consciousness northward toward the Pillars' sanctuary. The monuments were semi-sentient beacons that were hard to miss even with his attention partially elsewhere. Greeting him with their usual primal contentment they appraised him on the status of the world at large with wordless hints and impulses. The Hylden were restive, the kingdoms of men were generally at peace, no new cataclysms were on the near horizon. Kain put to them the question of the moment and received an immediate and not-unexpected answer. Nature's persona came to the fore of the group and filled his thoughts with instructions and advice on the nature of clouds and the patterns of the winds along with myriad other details too complex to understand easily. Kain mentally recoiled at the volume of knowledge on a subject he had never studied before. It was quickly apparent that while he might summon up a clear day at will, the ramifications for the rest of the continent might be dire if it was done wrong. He made a note to converse with the Pillar about it at length another time.

"… And- Really, Kain. Are you even listing? I swear you are the most insufferable creature. Even that filthy old malcontent Vorador has the decency to listen to an honest grievance from his kin; tin-pot dictator that he is. We're not even worth that much to you, are we?!"

Kain blinked, returning to the conversation at hand. "No. Not particularly," he offered thoughtfully, still mulling over ideas involving the weather. "At first I thought I might become attached to you all, given enough time in your company. I was fond enough of you the last time, so there was always the chance I would be again. But apparently my taste in companions has changed considerably over the years. Knowing how it would all work out in the end, I just didn't have the stamina to care a second time. I regret to say that you three have just been a means to an end for me."

Sebastian shut up for a full minute as the honest assessment sunk in. Sadly it didn't last. "We were a means to an end? What end? What do you mean _last time_? Sometime I really think you're as mad as a magpie, Kain. It's a wonder Vorador and the others judge you safe to be around, much less follow." The young vampire's amazement gave way to a fresh torrent of disgust. "Rather that I had been born of Vorador's getting that have suffered pointlessly under your uncaring yolk all these decades…. Well! No more! I and my fellows are leaving your _august_ presence, sire, and you will just have to content yourself to rule over your true subjects! I doubt you'll miss us. It seems the shadows, rats and trulls that occupy this street are more to your liking!"

"Very well." Kain waved a hand in idle acceptance. "Have fun. Don't come back."

Faustus looked to his livid brother and dared to speak up. "We're leaving to found our own cabal and overthrow your plans for the city… And you say 'Have fun'? What kind of madman are you?"

"A bored one." Kain shot back. "Off you go."

"Don't you even care what our plot is?" Marcus protested weakly. Sebastian looked death at his brother who quickly shut up.

Kain slouched back into his throne. "Not really. I'll just let you three impress me. As for doing without you, I imagine I'll get along well enough. Most of the time you lot did more harm than good. Go off and do whatever pleases you, children. It will not change Vorador's or my own plans a jot. Just do whatever it is as far from me as possible, and I will honestly have no further quarrel with any of you."

Sitting up, he directed a final shot at the already frazzled Sebastian. "Cross me however, and you will be crushed."

Kain opened his front door from where he sat, sending the kinetic pulse with a kingly gesture. "Now. Get out of my sight."

For a minute the three vampires stared alternately at him, and the door, stunned by his declaration. Finally Sebastian clicked his tongue in disgust. With a swirl of his elegant cape and click of his boots, he stormed out of the room taking much of the aura of hurt pride with him. "Come brothers!" He called from the street. "We will not linger in this moldering ghetto a moment longer. We have friends, in more lovely places, whom are eager for our company! Our future awaits!"

Kain rolled his eyes and looked at the other two. Faustus was still incredulous, his long fingernails tapping his thigh as he considered his liege and the open door. "Is this some kind of trick?" He wondered aloud. "You're not going to slaughter us out of spite?"

"Why bother?" Kain didn't have to feign ennui. He rested his chin on his fist and waited for their inevitable decision.

"We plot against you!" Faustus hissed. "We have sworn an oath, Kain, that we shall be the authors of your downfall!"

"Have you now?" Kain felt almost pleased. "Good for you. That's the first evidence of any long-range initiative that I've seen from any of you since the very beginning. I'm impressed."

Faustus bridled at the apathetic response. "Maybe you _can't_ destroy us," he pondered the new hypothesis. "Maybe you've grown weaker. You haven't had a real fight since your last evolution… Maybe your advanced age has finally caught up to you, Kain?"

"I wouldn't count on it." Kain bestowed a smile that was mostly teeth. "Go on then. Get lost. And take that other ditherer with you. I won't have him here."

"But Kain…" The last of his crop of children gasped.

He cut the vampire off before Marcus could do something damn foolish like change his mind about rebelling. "No no, child! Don't renege. You'll ruin the moment. Off you go and form your new cabal. I've no further use for you." The calculated level of indifference had the desired effect. His last two lieutenants snarled in hurt fury and stalked off after the instigator.

Kain mentally slammed the doors shut on their heels and considered the empty house. It was a fine old building, richly appointed, if more to Vorador's taste than his own. He tapped the arm of his favorite chair in thought. Vorador and his peace-loving sire were across the canal. The enclave had until now been well hidden behind the shabby exterior of an old lodging house. Sadly, keeping its whereabouts from Sebastian and the others hadn't been an option. The cantankerous old bastard wouldn't be well pleased to learn he would have to move. He smiled grimly. With the threat of war around the corner, the whole of Meridian was soon going to be too hot to hold them regardless of any of his former-lieutenants plans. It was time to pull back to the countryside, and begin swelling the ranks of his little army in earnest.

Standing, Kain resolved to pack some of his more portable and valuable possessions off to Vorador's cabal while time remained. No doubt Sebastian had run straight to his zealot friends howling for revenge. But with fate dancing to a tune of _his_ making, Kain was not concerned that the attack would begin a moment before dawn. It took a while to mobilize and prepare a strike force of the size the Saraphan would be obliged to muster. He was an extremely dangerous creature after all. There was time, if he didn't dawdle, to pack the essentials. The fire wouldn't be the complete loss it had been the first time.

The only worry was that he wouldn't make it back from his errands soon enough to put in his part of the performance. If the knights were going to put so much effort into it, the least he could give them was a show. It was probable after all that the fools would supply him with some light entertainment, and if he was lucky, breakfast.

??????????

In the end he was confident that none of his neighbors, the owners of the tall dusty tenements on either side of his hovel, would think to thank him for his kindly intervention on their behalf. The Saraphan brought torches with them, as he'd known they would. Somewhere in the first five minutes of their scramble to get him, one of the idiots had naturally brushed against the moth eaten drapes, and the rest, as they said, was history. Kain danced between several pillars of roaring flames, the remains of the primary support struts holding up his roof, and let the Reaver drink its fill of souls, or blood, or whatever its preference of the hour was. The blade hummed with contentment as it was pulled free of an unfortunate knight. He was half tempted to tease it for 'purring' the way the weapon thrummed happily in his grip. Sadly there wasn't really a good moment for a heart-to-heart. Two monstrously large mortals with axes both tried, and failed, to get the better of him in quick succession. Cutting first low, then high to block and behead the second soldier, Kain had to marvel at the man's dimensions.

Years ago in an alternate time-stream, he had suspected Hylden meddling in the Saraphan ranks as an explanation for their prowess. But clearly the human paladins hadn't needed the intervention, they were stupendously large by birth. He pitied the woman that had carried his current foe within her as a babe and labored to draw him forth into the world. Or perhaps as children the knights were undersized, he idly speculated. Maybe the Priesthood had found some miraculous food to push upon it's orphans and acolates such that their muscles grew even as their brains shrunk. It was something worth looking into, when he had exhausted all other means by which he could kill time in a given century.

Dancing backwards, out of the way of another mighty axe. Kain took the opportunity to kill another knight as he bumped into him, before turning back to his latest target. The titan had delivered a fantastic blow, but now was paying the price. The tip of the knight's blade had embedded itself in the old timbers of his floor. Stepping up onto the back of the axe head while his opponent struggled to pull it loose, he tisked the templar's startled expression before punching the cow-eyed farmboy in the face. Judging the level of the flames, and the general lack of new opponents, he caught the bear-sized human by the edge of his breastplate and hauled him out of the middle of the inferno. It looked like the preliminaries of his fight were done, and so was his house.

It had taken surprisingly little effort to corral the flames to the confined area and keep them from spreading. With his magic keeping winds and whimsy from spreading the disaster beyond his doorstep, they rapidly consumed his portion of the narrow row of buildings, burning a neat slice out of the remaining structure. There was no need, he could see, for the poor bastards who shared his slum to have to suffer just because destiny demanded _his_ property burn to the ground. Meridian was smoky and miserable enough without a major fire wreaking havoc in its docks. Kain patted himself on the back for his generous nature as he nimbly stepped over the charred remains of his doorstop and out into the street. Hurling his rescued knight bodily into the waiting arms of the reinforcements only furthered their panic.

The clouds broke overhead even as the crowd of soldiers all turned to stare at him, proving that Nosgoth herself had a sense of showmanship. Or maybe the world at large was just humoring his good mood. Kain didn't know. Blinking a little at the sudden brightness of morning, he planted the Reaver blade's point between his feet and folded his claws over its hilt, feeling the heat of the flames at his back. Neither fire nor sunlight could do more than annoy him, if he so chose. Instead of throwing himself right into their confusion and butchering the bunch, he indulged himself a moment to inspect their ranks.

The look of abject terror on the faces of the poor fools in front of him was worth the hassle of relocating outside the city. This was one vampire-raid they would not soon forget.

Kain smiled slowly, savoring the moment. He could almost feel the legend of the morning's battle being born. As petty as it was? He had to confess he was enjoying himself. "Now." He murmured softly to the slack-jawed mob. "_Run_."

With their captains dead, and their prey clearly more than they'd bargained for, the humans took his advice. Two of them led his titan away by supporting his shoulders. Kain shook his head at the idea that the ox-sized soldier he'd cavalierly thrown a moment before had lived through his mistreatment. A few of the other Saraphan knights had probably broken his fall, he smirked. The constables half scrambled, half limped their way down the main street and around a corner out of sight. A far cry from the haughty pride they'd arrived with, he sighed in amusement.

A few pale faces peered out at him from behind filthy glass, his neighbors finally brave enough to see what the commotion was all about. Kain ignored them, knocking the gore off his sword and sheathing it across his back before turning to admire the last of the blaze. The roof beams gave up at last, too fire-eaten to support their own weight. The crash of collapsing shingle and rafter, and the ensuing gout of smoke skywards had an undeniable element of poetry to it. He smiled at how entertaining his morning had been, almost sorry that the fight was over.

Sadly there'd been no sign of Faustus or the others. He hadn't seriously expected them to show. But if one had broken with history and decided to come and watch the charade? There could have had a moment of real fun in pinning one of his ungrateful spawn to the pavement and stepping on his neck. With no pressing appointments to be anywhere, he watched the fire a few minutes longer and then picked his way over the bodies to the nearest sewer entrance. There was plenty of time to catch a nap someplace discrete and get his urge to grin uncontrollably under wraps before he was obliged to go tell Vorador his news.

??????????

"I still say you should have killed them." Vorador grumbled as he kicked a clod of cinders that had probably once been a banister. "You foresaw their rebellion weeks ago, why let it happen? You put all of us at risk."

Kain made a disapproving noise at his partner's unnecessary fears and watched Janos prod the half-buried remains of a guardsman unlucky enough to be caught beneath a collapsing wall. They had already argued about traitors, Saraphan, and what was to be done, for the better part of the day. With dusk he'd invited them to continue their debate on his former-doorstep, just to get some fresh air.

Vorador examined the blackened remains of his house with an eye of amused toleration, but Janos seemed genuinely concerned. _Everything_ the man did was genuine. Kain despaired at ever seeing the vampire demonstrate an ounce of venality. When he wasn't being compassionate, he was insufferably _earnest_. Really the Saraphan could have taken notes, if they'd wanted a true role model for chivalrous behavior. Even after several hundred years of putting up with the blue-skinned sage, Kain still had the impatient itch to knock him into a wall at times.

The ancient vampire looked a hunch-backed cripple with his wings circumspectly tucked beneath his long cloak. The mortal currently on the receiving end of his pitying look was undeniably dead, not to mention three-quarters mangled. There'd be no restoring him. The urge to tell the pacifist that the corpse had probably been a wife-beater or craven drunkard and hence deserved his fate was amusing, but hardly likely win him any charitable feelings from the fussy old man. Instead, Kain answered Vorador's complaint.

"I knew they were going to betray me since before their inception, old friend. They proved useful enough for a time. And will now likely be more useful still, at least for a little while. Then they'll be dead, and your worry will be irrelevant."

"You knew all along." Vorador gave him a look he was well familiar with. Being ogled as if he was a madman was expected when conversing for more than a minute by the green-furred vampire. Vorador simply had no appreciation for the absurdity of life. His stalwart seriousness was part of his charm.

"You knew all along and still bothered to raise and train them?" The vampire repeated. He seemed stuck on the concept. "Why put yourself through all the trouble, Kain? You're hardly the type to enjoy useless labor."

"It was necessary." Kain shrugged, gesturing to the smoldering remains. "So was this."

He shifted his cloak so as to be able to rest his hand on the hilt of the Reaver hanging from his belt. The sword hummed again at him as his fingers rubbed over the carved skull. The blade was also kind enough to provide an aura of comfortable warmth for its wearer on yet another dank and miserable Meridian night. Kain spared his favorite weapon a thought of gratitude, wishing - as ever - that it showed half the sentience it had during its first few years since the restoration. That the blade was fond of him, he could readily determine. Whether it had any concept or idea of what was going on around it, or to him, he could no longer sense.

The spirit within the weapon had grown progressively more subdued over time. The soul within retreating further from the waking world with every day and month that passed. Soon he was certain the blade would be very much as it had always been. Alive, but not living, the Soul Reaver slept as Nosgoth shifted and changed, awaiting it's next moment of awakening at the hands of a Raziel-not-yet-born. At least this time, he did not feel the bitter hatred and dispair from it's fitful dreaming. Madness, it seemed, was not an immediate development. He wished however, that he could ensure that the soul trapped within the steal would not be lost to him completely. He'd come too far with _his_ Raziel to ever feel truly comfortable trading him in for another. It was both worrying, and insolvable, at least for the moment.

In another fifty years' time his theory of repetition would be truly put to the test. If everything went as expected, whether his sword was mute or not wouldn't matter, because there would still be another Raziel alive and aware in the world. A sane copy of his lieutenant at his side, to someday merge with and restore the version sacrificed to his weapon, would go along way towards convincing him that he was on the right path. All that was required was patience. Kain sighed and nudged some rubble with his foot. He hated waiting.

"Necessity." Vorador looked around the neighborhood. "Forgive me, Kain, if I seem stupid, but I fail to see how this could have been needed."

"They're baiting our trap, remember?" Kain tapped his claws idly on his hilt. "All that lovely misinformation we concocted for them is even as we speak being eagerly delivered into the hands of those who want it most." He laughed. "Besides, it has been amusing to torment them occasionally over the years. You can hardly call anything that's kept me entertained and out of trouble for a century or so a complete loss, now can you?"

"They'll come after my cabal next, you damn fool. They've already tried once. Even now they're arming for a more serious incursion…" Vorador griped, digging his claws into the crumbling masonry. "Unlike you I have more than myself to think about! _My_ children are not all traitors and imbeciles like yours. Are we supposed to sit back and watch them get slaughtered by the turncoats?"

"Not at all." Kain conceded. "That would be unkind of me, old friend. Not to mention ill advised." He waived the winged vampire closer to join their discussions. "I think that it is time to confront this particular 'scourge' once and for all, gentlemen. We have been skulking long enough in this city. It would be nice to have this war tidied up and done before we're obliged to start the next one, don't you agree?"

"The Hylden." Janos murmured darkly.

"Exactly so." Kain nodded. "It is time to assemble our little flock and relocate someplace more… discrete while we prepare. Perhaps Mobius' old citadel will serve? Since clearly I don't have the knack for creating useful fledglings, I fear the task will fall to you and yours Vorador. Can we have an army in time?"

Considering the challenge, the old vampire raked his goatee. "Yes. Yes I think there will be time to fledge and train an additional group. Especially if we stick with small sorties to start."

"In that case let us proceed with all due haste." Kain gestured that they should all depart the scene of his most recent prophesy. "Cheer up, Vorador. The mountains are lovely this time of year. And once the children are all safely out of the city, you can hang back and kill all the Saraphan you like." Feigning inspiration, he clapped his ally on the shoulder in friendly fashion. "You never know! Faustus might just be stupid enough to lead the charge! You never liked him anyway."

"Fast talking, flash bastard." The green vampire agreed, looking around as if saying goodbye to the city already. "Ah well, we had to give the place up sooner than later. The Saraphan have been goading this fight for years."

"Exactly." Kain threw back his hood to better appreciate the thick Meridian air. "Think of it as a generous gesture on your part. You're only giving them what they've been asking so insistently for."

Vorador snorted in cynical amusement. "I think it's the manner of the delivery that they might take amiss."

Kain grinned maliciously. "In that case they ought to have been more careful in the asking." Watching as Janos circumspectly doffed his cloak and took wing over the darkened city, Kain felt a momentary pang of jealousy. The ancient vampire made flight look so effortless, in addition to reminding him of the Raziel from the future who had briefly served at his side. Bats were all well and good, but they made for a poor way to travel if one wanted to enjoy the scenery.

Turning to Vorador he thought of something else. "Remind me to dispatch Janos north with the non-combatants for a decade or two. He's never been terribly interested in fighting humans, after all, and he can protect those for whom battle is unappealing at his old keep."

Vorador nodded in agreement. "He's better off out of it for now. Although I don't think you'll be able to keep him away should the Hylden come. They are one tribe against whom he has no difficulty wishing ill."

"I guess there's some heat left in his blood after all these years after all." Kain remarked, strolling beside the larger vampire. "Things will get a bit more lively for a while at any rate. I confess I've been rather looking forward to it."

Vorador gave him yet another variation on his insanity-implying stare. "Are you sure you're sane?"

"Quite sure." Kain chuckled and lead the way into the sewers.

??????????

A more poetical man might have remarked that the nighttime noises seemed less threatening in Meridian now that the vampire cabal had taken its leave. Kain smirked at the sound of footpads racing over the rooftops of the church nearby. In reality the city felt little different, even with its dramatic reduction in undead population. With the exception of a few well placed spies and a generous double-handful of informants, he was the last vampire within the city's sphere of influence. The conventional human criminal element was more than happy to fill the void. He wondered morbidly if perhaps his kind would be missed given a few weeks of unbridled gang warfare on the docks.

He settled himself onto a toppled and forgotten obelisk as he considered the mist shrouded cemetery. Despite being on the high side of the city, it had gone out of fashion with the noble families to bury their dead here compared to a hundred years prior. Now they all had private mausoleums outside the city, or paid to be buried in the crypts within the church itself. Probably _he_ had something to do with that. Kain mused.

Not fifty feet from where he sat lay the remains of Sebastian's burial plot. Beloved second son of the House of Delile, tireless public servant of Meridian; never had he seen a tomb marker more fanciful. He'd disinterred and raised the avaricious fool mere days after he had been covered in sod. The resulting scandal had left quite the impression on his community, apparently. Kain snorted, entertained by the magnitude of the human's alarm should he track down the worthless vampire, behead him, and restore his corpse to its rightful place.

How ironic then, that not two plots over lay a far better sort of man, a true gentleman in every way. Kain reached out to dust some of the random filth from the simple monument. Here he found words far more believable. Magnus von Etrisden, the engraving read: beloved father, grandfather, and husband, and then the dates. Magnus had lived long for a human of this age, some fifty years. He didn't regret the small part he played in seeing that happen. As a vampire, Magnus had been a valuable and useful creature, a vast deal different from his contemporaries. But as a man it seemed he had not been without a full measure of success and happiness. He did not regret turning aside the fate that had once befallen the human, even if it meant the past hundred years had been nothing but the grim toleration of the other three.

"Well well, Magnus. I think you at least have escaped the tedium of history repeating itself." He signed. "Not that I think you would ever thank me, I make a poor guardian angel after all."

The grave was silent as ever. The dank night air curled through the long grasses.

"You were better off as a mortal, old friend. Rising to join me would have brought you nothing but trouble."

Kain rested his elbows on his knees, considering what he knew about the future-past and what he could extrapolate from the effects of his own changes on the continuum. It had been nothing to stop the outlaw destined to kill the knight as a young man. Similarly little effort had been necessary to shield him at the few points in his life that had required intervention. As a human, Magnus had attributed his survival until old age to luck. Kain snorted, knowing full well that luck was usually a byproduct of hard work and attention to details. Still he couldn't begrudge the old man his delusions, had never shown his hand, even when paying silent visit to his one-time-friend's deathbed. Magnus had been content with his life. That was enough for Kain.

He had seen at least two futures with his own eyes, his ruminations with the Pillars had shown him infinitely more possibilities. One way or another Magnus-the-vampire would have been betrayed by his brethren and killed, or worse. Even now, Kain hesitated at the idea of raising him. The immediate danger was past, even encumbered with a fledgling he could escape the city easily. For a few years yet he might enjoy the company of one rational creature amidst Vorador's idiotic flock. Staring at the grave, he already knew he wouldn't.

Bad enough that he had, and would again, sacrifice one loyal friend, to his cause. He grimaced at the weak sentiments implied in the word. Raziel and Magnus both had been in their way far more than mere vassals, as dear to him as family could be, he supposed. But Raziel's torment was a foregone conclusion. Galling though that might be he could not yet see a way around it. At least Magnus was not so integral to history that he must suffer as well. Standing up, Kain dusted his trousers with his claws, saying a temporary farewell to the familiar grave. It would be some years, he suspected before he visited it again. "Rest in peace, old friend. You deserve it."

Out of the corner of his eye, Kain spotted a band of sun-glyph enhanced knights. Normally he would let such obstinate prey pass. Certainly they had no idea he was near. They wouldn't be marching so idly by if they did. They would have had to pass far closer to his quiet hiding place for their wards to flash the alarm. Still, with Vorador and his ilk gone from the city, there was no particular reason _not_ to harass them. It wasn't like anyone could complain that he was stirring up trouble. Trouble was coming, with or without him. And the temptation to leave a final parting enigma for Sebastian was also strong.

Feeling nostalgic, he drew the Soul Reaver. "Well Magnus, perhaps I will indulge in one more hunt, for old time's sake."

He grinned as he silently leapt first to the top of the wrought iron fence, and then into the thick of the soldiers. The first was crushed beneath his claws. Gravity did most of the work as he slammed the armored body to the paving stones by landing on him. Vaulting from the shattered corpse he let his weight carry another startled Saraphan down, snapping the stunned knight's neck as they fell. From there it was child's play to kill the remaining six. He let the Soul Reaver feed until it was sated, it's aura a cool burn along his arm. Sheathing it, he could feel the phantom flames tickle his shoulder as he fed himself as well. The taste of blood, raw and vital reaffirmed his sense of nostalgia. There would be no more hunts like this for a while to come. Other than the brigands in the forest, on whom Janos would not approve of feeding, there would be precious little sport. The Blood Shrines were all well and good for feeding large groups of vampires discretely, but he had lived too long without them to ever feel truly satisfied by such mundane means of acquiring food. Some lingering element of his Dark Empire nature, he supposed. He preferred his meals with a little fight in them.

Looking at his handiwork he couldn't help but snort in laughter at how easily they'd fallen. The fools hadn't even had the wits to send up a cry of alarm. Kain stooped and gathered up several fallen swords, and after a moment's deliberation, their banner as well.

The flag he lay at the foot of Magnus' monument. The swords he blithely drove one-by-one into the carved wooden angel that decorated Sebastian's abandoned resting place. Old as the wood was, it was of fine quality. It barely split as the weapons were driven through and left nailed into the sculpture's heart. The end result was rather artistic, really. He smirked as he walked away. Let his traitorous offspring make of it what he would.

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	10. Chapter 10

**Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King**

AU/continuation- fan-fiction for LOK:Defiance

**The Beginning – Chapter 1**

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There was just something so horribly mundane about making war against mankind when other opportunities were available. Kain had spent the better part of a thousand years quashing one human army after another during his Dark Empire. He and his lieutenants had treated it seriously in the beginning. When they'd grown so strong that the need for seriousness was done, they'd looked on the chore philosophically. Finally time and repetition had dulled even that noble aspiration, and his children had just run down the idiots for sport.

There was no 'winning' a war with humans, Kain had finally concluded after long centuries of studying the problem. There might be a cessation of hostilities as both sides retreated to lick their wounds, but a decisive victory was hopeless. Even if he trounced one generation, the one two cycles later would inevitably wish to revolt again. Human attention spans were short enough that they'd simply forget loses as they forgot everything else. To claim 'victory' when your opponent had the attention span of a magpie was at best an exercise in futility.

In the end he's just left the remaining fools to their own devices. The Human City and its stony defenses served as a distraction for his evolving children after Raziel's death at the hands of the maelstrom. The fortress was useful in its way, a deadly puzzle box for young vampires to wrestle with while their elders plotted and schemed against each other.

Given the choice of butchering humans, or picking fights with Hylden and their ilk, or better yet, the false god beneath the lake, Kain would have cheerfully left the lesser prey alone. Still, one could hardly refuse a fight when it was brought to one's door. The Saraphan wouldn't just go away if he told them their attempts to subdue him were boring beyond belief. Kain snorted to himself. He would have loved to see the expression on the poor fools' faces had he tried to dismiss them on the eve of battle with such an explanation.

As galling as it was to put so much food on the table for the tentacled beast, doing at least a minimal amount of harvest among the herd seemed unavoidable. He almost regretted that the Hylden wouldn't come out and play in the form of the Saraphan Lord. Without Janos' captive blood to help draw it forth into existence there could be no Nexus Stone to open a portal for his green eyed adversaries. He could feel them picking at the bindings that held them, but the Pillars were plenty strong as yet. They wouldn't be getting through any time in the next few years. That left him only the humans, and 'god' to dally with. The squid, whatever it was plotting, was doing so very discretely of late. The humans however were a nuisance. Kain had hoped that the Saraphan knighthood would be able to put up some sort of worthwhile offensive when pressed by an opposing political and military force.

Sadly not.

When faced with an organized foe, the church knights had precious little to offer other than ham-fisted tactics and repetitive speeches. Their power-base in Meridian was eroding even as they spent their soldiers like pennies out on the hills and highways. Here and there Kain could sense Sebastian's hand at work, a glimmer of subtly, a hint of cleverness, but the boy was centuries young yet to know how to correctly marshal the clods of mud he had for allies. He was only one vampire attempting to subvert a centuries old human institution. The odds of success weren't favorable, no matter how persuasive he was. Once or twice he caught sight of an errant child in the heat of battle, Sebastian's blue cloak, or Faustus' red one. But they never tarried long where he might reach them. In that sense they weren't fools. Vorador cursed steadily each time Faustus especially managed to escape his troops. The green nobleman had a long running grudge against his second-born offspring. Kain couldn't blame him. There was something about Faustus that set any reasoning creature's teeth on edge within moments of meeting him.

Still, other than the annoyance of not catching his misfit children and stepping on their necks, the war was not entirely pointless. It was proving excellent training for the young members of his extended family. From small sorties to major battles, his army was gaining in skill and experience with every year that passed. It would be considerable years yet until he was ready to sweep the continent, perhaps, but the smaller towns and cities were ripe for the picking. Soon Coorhagen or Stenchenroe might even be within the realm of possibility. Meridian he would undoubtedly have to save until the end. A prolonged siege of its sooty walls was not something to embark upon lightly.

With any luck, Kain mused, he wouldn't have to fight the southern metropolis at all. Merchant-state that it was, Meridian might simply open the gates and let him in when the time came. The great city was too sensible of the profits in joining the winning side to zealously cry 'down with the tyrant' for long. The church elders were already finding the population of the slums remarkably apathetic about continuing their vampiric 'purge' now that the purging was proving more difficult than promised.

Kain watched the tail end of a particularly one-sided battle from the roof of an abandoned monastery. The humans had set fires to the grasslands, hoping to burn their enemies and buy themselves time to retreat in a single stroke. It was a pity therefore that the winds that had blown so promisingly all evening had died promptly when the blaze might have spread. He shook his head at the hopelessness of their task. Surely the church realized by now. 'God' might be on _their_ side, but Nosgoth was on _his_. Kain reached out and nudged the Pillar of Nature again for good measure. Not wanting rain, for that would hurt his troops as much as the fire would, but encouraging the hearty grasses of the meadowland to dig deep, pulling moisture up out of the soil and into themselves in order to become more difficult to burn.

The fire, like the human's retreat, was a general failure. Seeing no need to participate further, Kain left the fighting to the young ones in the field. Vorador's captains could use the practice, and the inevitable meal, that the battle would provide.

Sliding off his perch on the shingles, he descended into the main room of the tower, finding his green ally already inspecting the spoils. Some enlightened human had unwillingly bequeathed them a library. Kain glanced at a few of the gold-lettered spines idly, trusting Vorador to do a more extensive inventory. Undoubtedly the old bastard would want to take a cart's-worth home with him to add to his collection. It was a harmless enough hobby. Kain saw no reason to disallow it. Vorador was far more genial about their co-leadership of the army when allowed to do as he pleased on occasion.

Seeing a particularly familiar volume tucked amongst the religious tomes on either side, he pulled it free of the stack and flipped it over in his hands. The idea that a farcical collection of short stories, supposedly collected from actual pilgrims on a journey to Avernus, was kept by a Saraphan librarian made him snort with laughter. Traditionally such things were burned. Either the keeper of the collection didn't know what he'd had, or the human had possessed a rare sense of humor.

Kain held the book out for Vorador when the vampire raised an eyebrow at him to ask what was so amusing. The green furred nobleman shook his head in grim amusement. "I see you've found something fitting for even _your_ tastes here. I have a copy at home, you know."

"Strange isn't it?" He tucked the book under his arm, pleased at the discovery. "That the banned books are always the ones first to be transcribed when the copyists sit to their labors."

"Copyists get bored of reading this crap too, I suppose." Vorador gestured at the majority of the shelves. "Something a little sordid and funny probably goes a long way towards keeping a man sane when he spends the rest of his life transcribing the gloriously dull history of saints."

"You find anything worth keeping?" Kain looked around, getting a rough sense of the library's layout. The room's caretaker had known his craft, from the looks of things. There was a sense of organization to the piled manuscripts and scrolls.

"A few treatises on astronomy that are interesting, a better copy of the Lingua Mathematica than I currently possess…" The vampiric nobleman had browsed most of the shelves already. "Some maps that you will no doubt want to get your claws into. One or two tomes of vampire script."

"Really?" That at least caught his attention. "Anything of merit?"

It was rare to find a genuine piece of ancient lore left in the world after the mass burnings that the first Crusade had encouraged. The crumbs of wisdom left were well nigh unreadable due to age and the general prossiness of the script Janos' tribe favored. Kain had taught himself portions of the tongue in a haphazard fashion during the later years of his Dark Empire, but only as much as he needed to solve the puzzles in front of him. General mastery of the language he left to people with more time on their hands. If there was something truly worth knowing, undoubtedly Vorador would tease him with it later.

The green vampire shook his head in answer. Seeming resigned to the idea that what little was left from the civilization that had raised him was tatters and junk. "Seemingly not. A record of commerce between two of their larger cities, now long gone, and an illumnated copy of The Book of the Wheel. Which I must confess, I find far less comfortable reading these days than previously."

"What's the matter… Finding it hard to enjoy tales of a kind and benevolent god after you've met him for yourself?" Kain drawled ironically, knowing as well as his companion did that the revelation he'd shared with both Vorador and Janos hadn't been pleasant for any of them.

The old vampire 'bible' spoke of a god who was everywhere; within every heart, and stone, and river. Little had the poor creatures who'd written the verse known that the words were far more literal than their poetry had intended.

Janos had gone silent for two weeks together after coming face to face with the beast who called itself the Hub of the Wheel. Never having had counted himself particularly religious, even as a human, Kain couldn't guess what had gone through the old vampire's mind. Still Janos had overcome his shock, and while not comfortable speaking about the false god beneath the waters, he was at least free of its power to manipulate. With he and the Soul Reaver standing ready to deliver swift punishment for any infraction, the tentacled monster under the lake had been almost polite as it was inspected as avidly as any fairground attraction.

Kain could only be grateful that the sight the blade had granted to him on its rebirth could also be shared with others. The vampires had only to rest their hands on top of his, on the Reaver's hilt, and they too could see into the Astral plane to where the beast lurked. If they'd had to take his word alone for it, he doubted he could have made the sage forgive him for the blasphemy. As for Vorador, the nobleman thought he was plenty mad most days, but raving about a world-eating cephalopod living underground wouldn't have won him any prizes for sanity.

The distant din of arms and armor drew him to a narrow window. Once again curious to know how the battle fared outside.

The humans were making their last stand from the looks of things. Kain tilted his head to get a better feel for the lightness of the horizon to the east. There was time enough, if the children hurried, to make a proper end to the battle. He left Vorador to his books as he climbed the stairs once more. Pulling a horn from is belt, he blew a note for the men in the field, giving them fair warning of the hour. The troops didn't stop in their work, but he could sense their renewed urgency as they cut their way through to the back of the mortal line.

From the roof, the charred acres of grassland around him looked like a massive smear of charcoal over an otherwise clean canvas. Kain tutt'ed at the mess, even as he felt the thrum of renewed life in the burned out patches. Nosgoth was brimming over with vitality in this age. Compared with the world he had lived in for so long? This realm was almost decadent in its fruitfulness. One good rainstorm, maybe a week of time, and the whole of the trampled and charred battlefield would be green again. Perhaps it could be restored even sooner, with a little help. He mused about tidying up his battlefield with a nudge of Pillar-assisted-magic. Probably it was best to leave well-enough alone. With his luck he'd restore the grass only to have it over run the abandoned Keep. The Pillars of Nosgoth were strong, there was no question. Working to make them grasp the concept of _subtlety_ was an ongoing process however.

Counting standards as his small army regrouped in victory, he made note of the various captains. All but Umah's crests were present on the field. Vorador's youngest and yet most talented wife was dispatched on a mission to Meridian. Still not sure if he'd done right in sending the dusky woman to do what, in a past life, he had done for himself, Kain looked forwards to news of her.

There was no Saraphan Lord in this era, but there was still a leader for the human crusaders. The Patriarch of the Saraphan order had not yet dared to challenge him directly on the field, keeping to the safety of the southern city's walls. Had he been younger or more arrogant, he might have marched on Meridian and demanded the fool come out and give him satisfaction. He was far too old, and too bored, now to see how such a thing could have any purpose. If the human wanted to avoid a confrontation, he was more than happy to oblige him. Kain had no interest in creating a martyr.

Umah, unlike most of the young ones in their army, _did_ grasp subtlety. It hadn't taken much explaining to have her grasp the merit of his point-of-view. Death in battle would grant the knight just the sort of immortality his organization needed. If they couldn't have a glorious victory, they might yet salvage their reputation by having a noble defeat. Having the paladin die by something as mundane and pathetic as falling down the stairs, or choking on a bone? That would ensure that no child growing up in the city had any interest in worshiping the priesthood in the years to come. Not when there was greater pride, not to mention money, to be had working an honest trade.

Exterminating the crusaders was a temporary solution. What Kain wished for, was to kill the idea of crusaders all together. In a generation the Saraphan would be a laughingstock, over-dressed, over-zealous priests with delusions of grandeur. Without any glory to attach to their names, they would be forgotten by society at large as an embarrassment of history.

Kain reached out and leaned on the Pillars of Mind and Dimension, letting them carry him further still, across the southern half of the continent to the massive city on the coast. Meridian slept peacefully, for the most part. He felt somewhat giddy with the sheer quantity of life within its sprawling perimiter, all the flickering points of mortal consciousness gathered into one unbelievable mass. Somewhere in the misty anthill of humans, Umah was plotting the death of one particular little spark.

From a distance –even up close- one mortal's existence felt much like another to his magical senses. Picking out the Saraphan high priest amidst all the others was about as likely as finding a particular grain of sand on the beach. If he concentrated however, he could sense _her_. Barely more than a fledgling, Umah and her officers were still vampires enough to stand out from the rest. The general impression he got from the group was of patient anticipation. He withdrew his consciousness, not wanting to spoil their plans by meddling. They would either succeed, or they wouldn't. Kain had nothing particular to lose either way. At worst, he'd put a puppy in his place at the gates of the grand city. At best, he'd get there just as they were hanging the black buntings for the unfortunate human's death.

Inspecting the eastern sky again, Kain sounded his horn a second time. His troops didn't really need the reminder. Already retreating back to the monastery in the face of oncoming dawn, the soldiers seemed in good spirits. Across the field, the last survivors of the human force picked themselves up and thanked their lord for the advent of day. They would be spared to fight again, perhaps. Kain put his horn away and folded his arms against a convenient section of parapet, watching the mortals try and make sense of their situation. If they knew what was good for them, they'd scatter and forget all about their former masters. Bored with watching their antics, he relaxed against the stonewall and studied the sky instead.

The horizon glowed silver with the advancing sunlight. With nothing to fear from the commonplace miracle, Kain studied the transformation of color overhead. The phenomenon was undeniably beautiful. Wispy clouds were caught against the rapidly shifting blues and pinks beyond them like scurrying shadows. Birds who had slept fitfully through a night of battle were making musical racket as they woke themselves and made a start on their morning routine. It was hard to worry about whether he was on the right course or the wrong one with such a scene of splendor playing out in front of him. For a moment he left off worrying about the future and simply enjoyed the simple splendor of the present. Kain closed his eyes as he inhaled the clean breeze, feeling his sword sigh in sleepy contentment even as he did.

… _The Lark's on the wing… the snail's on the thorne: God's in his heaven… and all's right in the world… Isn't that how it goes?_

For a moment Kain froze, uncertain if he was awake or asleep. The familiar cadence of Raziel's speech came to him out of nowhere. His chest ached with the sudden yearning his child's voice inspired. Kain opened his eyes again, not at all surprised to see the grasslands before him were not the same as they'd been a moment prior.

It was dawn, but he was not looking over a battlefield. Rather the tower he stood on was now a mighty height over a much wider expanse of plains and forests. Willendorf? He mused as he looked hesitantly around him, afraid that the illusion would shatter if he moved too quickly. The landscape looked familiar, but not so much that he could be absolutely certain. To the east, the Pillars cast long shadows as the sun rose between them. Directly beneath him and spreading westwards, a glistening city slowly roused itself for morning. For a moment he watched the various citizens going about their business, amused to see two specific patterns in the flow of the streets. The human population was just coming awake and heading off to work, even as its vampiric neighborhoods were shuttering windows and preparing for sleep. Part of him marveled at the orderly coexistence even as another part of him insisted that it had been thus for years beyond counting.

… _All is right in the world…_ He heard himself echo Raziel's quotation. It was surreal to hear his own voice, yet know that no sound had passed his lips. The words felt familiar, as if he ought to know them. Kain was certain he had not heard them before, at least, not yet.

He _was_ dreaming, but it wasn't merely an idle fancy. It was the future. Kain sighed softly, no longer tired, but more wistful than ever. It was a beautiful city. The idea that he could be its lord and master - someday, if all went well - was not an unpleasant prospect.

The fact that the premonition had come to him now of all times, had to be a good sign. If he was remembering such a pleasant 'still to come' then that meant he hadn't made a hash of things yet with his war-games with the Saraphan.

_It's going to be a beautiful day, Kain._

The voice behind him spoke again, blurred a little, as if coming from a long way away. Half afraid of waking himself if he looked, Kain glanced sideways at where his companion leaned against the wall with him. He couldn't help the feeling of nostalgia any more than he could keep himself from staring appreciatively at the man's handsome profile. Raziel was dressed like a prince of the blood. A long finely tailored coat of crimson red fit tight from his child's neck to waist before cutting away to expose a pair of pale breeches and elegantly tooled leather spats. Even the vampire's toe claws seemed polished, as well tended as any mortal lord's boots. Court fashion, undoubtedly, Kain thought to himself, wishing he dared to speak his thoughts aloud, to tease the man about his finery.

Sadly trying to communicate with the ghosts of his future was a sure-fired way to break the spell. He bit his tongue, hoping to prolong the encounter as much as he could. It would good to see Raziel again, even if only for a moment. The future seemed to have been a good one, for his child this time. Groomed and confident, the vampire seemed completely at ease with himself as he admired the view. Turning to match his look briefly, his lieutenant smiled briefly in acknowledgment before studying the sky again.

All in red leather and white linen, his child's wings were a massive shadow at his back, as deep grey as the roof slates behind him. The individual feathers were not dull for all their subdued hue. Where they caught the light there were soft shimmers of iridescent color along their spines.

_Are you here to hurry me, child? I am not so old and forgetful yet that I need a chaperone to remind me of my duties. _Kain heard himself, his future aspect speaking, but the words grew more garbled as he tried to listen to them. Fate did not want him eavesdropping on the casual intimacy between his future-self and lieutenant, it seemed.

_Ah, but you forget, it was you who sent for _me _ this morning, oh-revered-sire._ _ As you have called, here I am. What is your bidding? _Raziel smiled with his reply, his entire posture radiating good-natured teasing. Kain could only gape at the vampire's easy poise, reminded in spite of himself, of how the man had been right before the end. Only once before, in all his years had he ever encountered a Raziel as unconsciously intimidating as this one. At the time, the imminent end of the world had somewhat distracted him from a whole-hearted appreciation of the vampire's beauty. This time there was no reason not to stare.

Raziel was perfection. He was like the glittering edge of a newly honed sword. What such a creature was doing speaking so kindly to an old bastard like _him_ was a genuine marvel. _This_ Raziel was his future? Kain couldn't help but wonder how on earth the miracle had come about. It was his intention, naturally, to treat his lieutenant with a modicum more kindness in this resurrection than the previous one. Especially after witnessing the sorrowful future the alternate version of his offspring had sprung from. But to think he'd had any hand in creating the elegant nobleman beside him was a remarkable thing. He'd have counted himself fortunate just to have _any_ Raziel at his side.

_Fly for me, Raziel. Tell me what you see this fine morning._

Watching as the handsome lord stirred and stretched beside him, he realized with a jolt that _he_ didn't have wings. Only his child had evolved the massive pair of extremities. He wanted to laugh at the turn of events. In this future too, it seemed, his lieutenant was destined to trump him in that aspect. It was hard to feel jealous when faced with such a beautiful creature however. Wings _suited_ Raziel.

Kain blinked in amazement as the specter of his future child obeyed his idle command. Stepping past him, and up a set of steps seemingly put there to that purpose, the vampire perched on the edge of the tower's railing a moment before fanning his wings and leaping into the air. There was no time for instinctive panic, only amazement, as Raziel moved from standing to airborne in the span of a breath. For all that their words were distorted by the haze of time, the clap of Raziel's wing beats in the still morning air was unmistakable. Kain smiled in appreciation at how effortless his child made it look. A few vigorous strokes and Raziel stretched his limbs wide, able to glide silently for several meters. Pirouetting gracefully, the vampire hung caught in an invisible thermal, buoyed upwards above even the tower's rooftop.

_What do you see?_ He could hear himself ask the flier, the words clearer than any previously. Attune with his future-self, he could feel the teasing fondness for the man above him joyfully similar to his own sentiments.

Raziel spiraled overhead, flying with no particular agenda other than to enjoy the freedom from gravity it gave him. Sparing him a playful glance, his lieutenant angled himself in the air and dropped away from his tower, only to circle around the far side and sweep over his head again like the proverbial lark of the morning.

_I see the world, Kain. Your fine capital, specifically. _ Raziel remarked drolly as he hung on the updraft again. _ I see _you_, dread lord. And really, what more could I ask for?_

_Flattery I do not need, child. _ Kain heard only pieces of his reply, extrapolating the rest as he recognized the unavoidable unraveling of the memory. It did no good to try and hang on to the vision. In concentrating on the fragment of 'might be' he was causing it to collapse all the quicker. Left with one final glimpse of Raziel sliding through the air, Kain blinked to find himself alone on top of the humble Keep again. Realizing his hands were out stretched, as if reaching for the now-absent specter of his lieutenant, he let them fall to his sides with a sigh.

It would probably be nine hundred years or more before he caught up with that particular sunrise encounter.

He rubbed his face and tried to council himself to patience. With so much time between then and now, there would be no guarantee that anything remotely close to what he had just witnessed would ever come to pass. There was plenty of time to mess up the timeline between now and then, and plenty of foes whom would undoubtedly enjoy meddling as well.

He half wondered if the fragments of future he was occasionally privy to see were meant to inspire him, or if they were rewards for his continued good behavior. Perhaps they came to him because something he did, or didn't do, brought him closer to _that_ future. Kain frowned, trying to piece together the likely path of cause-and-effect. If he was living in a closed-cycle, as he knew he was, then the future he'd just witnessed was the one that held the Raziel whom would then travel back in time. The infinite Ouroboros that was his child's destiny meant that he _was_ the Kain that would create that Raziel's future, and that in turn the Raziel he created would become his savior of his past.

His memories of the end of the world, and the fragile-seeming knight-errant of a child he'd plucked from his proper time, were still very real to him, despite the vampire's future now being an impossibility. Would his reminiscence change in time as his new Raziel grew into his future role? Probably not until that moment when the one course over wrote the other. Kain sighed in frustration. He was a creature within the timeline, for the most part, servant to its flow. He might get hints and glimpses of what was and what would come, but no more than hints.

Still there was something undeniably interesting, in the idea of such a Raziel meeting up with him in Moebius' keep in place of the other one. Kain smiled to himself, able to picture clearly the confidence and easy candor of the Raziel he'd just been shown. How would a lieutenant such at _that_ cope with the idea of a Kain from the past suddenly appearing under his nose? There would be no cringing from that one. The only wonder would be would the vampire even be interested in anything he had to say. A scruffy Kain from a shadow past demanding aid? Would such a Raziel scoff at the idea that 'Kain' needed his help? Would he quail at the idea of fighting Janos Audron? Surely not.

He grimaced at the idea of sacrificing such a wholesome Raziel to the Soul Reaver just to save his own jaded carcass. And yet, if the knight didn't do as his predecessor had, there would be no Kain to bring him into being. Either way, Raziel would cease to exist. He shook his head. Another way would show itself in eventually. It had before, when a third option had seemed impossible. It would again. He'd just have to be patient. Raziel was not yet even born. There was time.

Vorador found him still meditating on what ifs and maybes long after the sun was above the tree line. Wincing slightly as he adapted to the daylight, the nobleman sighed to find him woolgathering. "Still patting yourself on the back I see…"

"It seems so." Kain agreed, stirring himself from his slouch against the roof. "All the little ones tucked into bed?"

His companion snorted at his diminutive commentary on their troops' morning respite. "Something like that. What are you plotting, standing here so long."

"I plot nothing." Kain shook his head. "I was just remembering… something. Tell me, Vorador, does a poem with the line 'God's in his heaven… And all's right in the world,' ring any bells for you?"

Vorador frowned thoughtfully. "I can't say it does. Where did you hear it?"

"The future, I suppose." Kain sighed, resigned to having to wait to hear the rest. Someday some random person would put pen to paper and compose the full verse. Until then he'd undoubtedly be haunted by the few lines Raziel had quoted at him on the tower. He cursed his child for teasing him with only half a recitation at the same time as he unconsciously rubbed his claw tips over the Reaver's hilt. Thinking about Raziel, and the future, only made him want to hurry and start. All the dallying with the Saraphan was really nothing more than a way of killing time. Soon enough, he'd be able to take his first serious steps towards founding his empire. His fingers itched to get started.

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Meridian was too big, and too corrupt a city for Kain's as yet small army to take on, but the Saraphan priests that sought to rule it were no more. Victorious, he and his cabal had set forth to try their hand at softer targets in order to further test their mettle. Uschtenheim was theirs, Janos' aerie reclaimed, as were the fertile lands that had once belonged to the devilish dollmaker. Dark Eden had ceased to exist as of the world's remaking, but its mountains and valleys were firmly within vampire dominion.

Hemmed in by Stahlberg to the west, and Avernus, Willendorf, and the other major human cities of the south, Kain was cautious not to boast too soon. They had made considerable progress in expanding their 'safe' territory with the fall of the Saraphan priesthood. But the way to the Pillars was not entirely within their control, yet. The militias of Coorhagen and Stenchenroe fought them for the remainder of the woods east of Vorador's swamp. But no mere mortal action could keep _him_ from entering the Pillars' sanctuary.

As much as some mortals might strive to prevent it, word of a vampire kingdom was already on the wind among the towns and villages of the north country. Many of the more impoverished settlements were ripe for the picking, prepared to swear allegiance to any overlord who would not demand the lion share of their meager crops in exchange for protection from the bandits.

Exploiting the luxury of the rescued blood fountains still hidden about the countryside, Kain's army did not need to depopulate the rural provinces in order to keep itself fed. The majority of the peasants that went missing, after his troops passed by, tended to end up as fledglings rather than food. It might not have been quite what the downtrodden villages had dreamed of in terms of salvation, but it was better than many had expected.

There was every hope that the cool-acceptance he had received so far would rapidly warm into proper alliances when an outside enemy arrived. Better the devils already known, then the maddened demonic horde just over the horizon.

Kain enjoyed the evening breezes from the rooftop of the rambling manor house as he mused over the future.

Vorador had been kind enough, or perhaps resigned enough, after their recent wars and current taking-stock, to allow him a suite at his marshy mansion during the wet season. Having spent the better part of a year walking and riding the country's various highways in order to get a feel for what lay ahead; Kain was glad of a friendly place to shelter and plan his next move. He wanted to solidify his position as much as possible before the Hylden and their pet demons played their hand. All signs were favorable, but Kain wasn't about to rest on laurels this time. He had seen what his enemy was capable of.

Resplendent with fall color, and drier with the lack of summer rains, even Vorador's beloved swamp seemed more palatable than usual. Kain nodded in general approval, good humor steadfast for the moment. Even the recent gossip that had come his way, regarding his ill-favored offspring surviving the last Saraphan defeat, wasn't enough to sour his sanguinity. They would go to ground a few decades at least. What ever their plans were, he wasn't all that worried.

The dawn of the Empire was at hand. Kain smiled to himself at the thought, not forgetting for a moment the troubles and frustrations that were to come. Claw-tips resting on the hilt of his favorite weapon he couldn't help but be optimistic about the years ahead of him. Anticipated victories aside, there was another reason to celebrate now. It was well nigh time to try his hand at 'fatherhood' again. Some new lieutenants would be needed to assist with the continental wars to come. Raziel and his brethren would be a welcome change from his previous set whom alive or dead, had been little better than disappointments.

Patience was hardly one of his more pronounced virtues. Kain had to admit. Once beyond the walls of Meridian, the temptation had been there. Even knowing he was centuries early, he had weighed carefully and denied the impulse to seek his more long-lived children out and immediately raise them from their rest. Instead he'd contented himself with fighting with only Vorador's mob for help. It had gone well, but the tedium of it all had nearly driven him to murder.

Hardly interested in lying to himself anymore, he knew that Turel and the others, while useful, were not his aim. How many years ago now had it been since he had spoken with Raziel? It had been over two hundred, at the least. Time had not made the vampire's absence any less irritating to bear.

It was odd to realize how much he missed his lieutenant's company. Even his first-born's bursts of white-hot fury toward the end, were in hindsight, endearing. As he had once told Janos; had their positions been reversed, he doubted he would have taken on the role of martyr any better than his favorite child had. Fate had been monstrously cruel to Raziel, and would be again.

Knowing as he did the full flow of time, he was certain that waiting had been the right thing to do. A century too soon and the former-Saraphan knights would be battle seasoned to the point of boredom when the Hylden were set free. It would change their perspective on the world, and so their decisions and reactions to the wars to come.

Somehow Kain was certain that if he played his cards right, the replacement of one great war for another would dove-tail nicely into the flow of time. Rather than pitting his infant children against the unified might of the southern cities, they would instead be fighting Hylden. In time the humans would be forced to either join, or die as the fiends encroached on any unprotected lands.

Allowing what must happen to correspond closely to what he remembered happening in his alternate timeline, was beneficial on several levels. Ideally, it would aid him not only to stay on course with the future he was hoping to align himself with, but also would give him a measure of control over the predictability of new situations that might arise. His clansmen called him an oracle. Kain only wished that such a title was the truth. It wasn't that he didn't 'remember' the future, from time to time, but such dreams were rarely prophetic in anything but the most general sense. Mostly he was obliged to rely on simple observation and common sense. The fact that occasionally his previous trek through time overlapped with this reality gave him only a modest edge.

Even with reason and rationality telling him to wait, it had been painfully hard to not seek out the Saraphan tomb prematurely. To even go and look at it would have been too tempting, and so Kain had given the area between the Pillars and Mobius' former refuge a wide berth during his wanderings. The idea of setting out in the near future to deliberately go and unearth the shrine made him smile.

Considering his options, Kain concluded that late autumn would be a propitious time to fledge a set of new vampires. With the shortened days and dry weather, there would be plenty of time for the young fools to gain agility and a modicum of understanding before the inclement wet of springtime in the swamp drove them either indoors, or out into drier-if-less-friendly territory. It did leave a question of manners to resolve, however.

As ignorant of their unlived alternate future as everyone else, Janos and Vorador had at least met Raziel in the past. Or rather, met what was left of the vampire after the abyss and false god had done their work. Kain grimaced remembering his own culpability in his firstborn's ruined appearance. Still, at least his two contemporaries would understand, should he decide to announce his intention of retrieving Raziel and the others. They were fully aware of the end result, if not how the child would get to that point. The when and how of his firstborn's origin or demise, he had not as yet seen fit to share. There was no point, when everything might change again at any moment. All they needed to know was that Raziel and the others were necessary.

With six fledglings about to run amok in Vorador's already crowded manor, it was best to ask, or at least warn the other vampire lords of his plans. It was either that or schedule his immanent relocation to Moebius' abandoned fortress. The sanctuary was vampire domain now, but he found prowling the halls brought back too many memories for him to rest easy there. A flock of idiotic children to tend to would provide ample distraction he supposed.

Kain gauged the hour by the angle of the moon and decided that there was no time like the present to begin planning. Descending into the manor proper, he sought out the old vampire's customary hiding place in the library.

???????

What Kain had expected, on announcing his intention to raise a new batch of lieutenants to his closest allies, was their promise not to interfere. What he'd gotten in the end, was a bit of a parade.

He glanced behind him as they left the road and traveled further into the woods, and sighed in frustration. Several of the fledglings were bungling an effort to coax one of the ox carts off the mud track and between the old trees. Vorador leaned forward in the saddle as he alternately scolded and advised his more adept children in correcting the mistake.

On hearing his agenda, the green vampire had not only endorsed the endeavor, but had volunteered himself to assist personally. Kain couldn't deny that the process of getting his six fledglings safely to the manor would be easier for the escort. The image of the massive furred vampire as some sort of demented midwife was hard to dispel however. Then there was Janos, who wasn't about to sit idly by and wait if Vorador was going to come along. Between the two of them, they had brought the better part of a brigade of attendants, companions, and guardsmen; along with such a quantity of supplies and goods that Kain was vaguely sure that he and his new brood could very easily weather out the better part of the year without ever having to return to the mansion.

His idle hope of a quiet reunion with his first-born and the others had been quickly and utterly dashed. As it was, he would be luck to get two words in private with any of his fledglings until they were all several months old. The crowd of vampires was full of chatter and energy, and not at all the discrete party that Vorador had initially outlined. On the other hand, Kain had to admit, the trip was far easier with all the extra hands to do the fetch and carrying. And being able to offload some of his more energetic children into the welcoming arms of a brood of supporters would allow him more chances for sleep than previously. It was hard to weigh whether he was better off. The first time had possessed a serene sort of tranquility, alone beneath the trees, but the care and feeding for his lieutenants first weeks of life had taken more effort than he cared to remember.

Overgrown and half buried as it was, Kain couldn't truly explain later how it was he knew they had arrived. Some distant memory, or perhaps a psychic vibration of the place, was enough to compel him to dismount and start pulling at an otherwise innocuous hummock of bushes. The earth and wind of Nosgoth would probably bury and reveal the tomb's outer walls dozens of times down through the ages before the crypt finally tumbled and fell. Already weather beaten, at least the carved stone angels were recognizable where the stood sunken into the forest floor. Kain uprooted the brush and small trees around the slab entrance while Vorador did him the service of keeping the overly curious at bay. Soon enough the vault's door was levered open and the inner sanctum revealed.

Kain's clawed feet clicked hollowly against the dusty marble surface of the floor. He scuffed a foot against the trapdoor leading to the hidden passages and treasure rooms below but had no interest in delving at the moment. There was plenty of time for that later if he needed the money. Moving into the center of the room he took an experimental breath and found the air stale but not yet unbreathable. The feeling of anticipation drove him to check that everything was as undisturbed as it should be.

Rahab's casket was closest. Kain's claws made quick work of the antiquated red wax seal and decorative nails used to secure the lid. Prying it gently from its resting place, Kain propped it against the wall before turning to inspect what was left behind. Laid out with only his weapons and helm to accompany him, Rahab's corpse was just as expected. Truly, his scholarly child-to-be didn't look his best. The corpse was long desiccated by the dry air of the crypt, even with its lead lined sarcophagus. But insects hadn't found their way into the tomb yet, and the Saraphan embalmers had done their duty by the holy-knights. Rahab's paper-thin grey skin held together against his bones, his dark hair was dusty and brittle, but hadn't pulled loose from his skull. The man looked centuries dead, naturally, but in good shape none-the-less.

Kain shrugged philosophically and repeated the process of removing casket lids for each of the interred occupants of the chamber. Even in death, Dumah seemed to sneer at the world while Melchiah had a more startled look about him. Death, or rather the manner of it, had clearly been unexpected for the knight. Kain smiled at the memory of Raziel's outraged assault on Moebius' fortress and its unlikely consequences. He had bent time more often than bore remembering, but in all his manipulations of the continuum he had never once been angry enough at his former-self to wish him dead. Really, he had gone out of his way to make sure to not interfere with his own past at all where ever possible.

Not so with Raziel. His firstborn had worked through a long and bitter path in order to reach a level of self acceptance, multiple paradoxes aside, but renouncing your former self unto death was a rather extreme move. Not to mention a paradox of near ludicrous proportion. A pity he would never be able to tease him about it. It was unlikely that the Raziel he was about to resurrect would have any memory of the occurrence. Staring down at his favorite's corpse, Kain decided his condition was as good, or as bad depending on one's expectations, as the rest. For the first time, Kain looked at the knight's face and recognized why the man seemed so aggravated. What a humiliating way to die, really. First belittled, and then out classed by the walking corpse that you would someday become; how ironic.

"Well well, child." He couldn't help but murmur down at the coffin. "Today is going to be the first day of the rest of your life."

A gentle thud of wood-on-stone behind him reminded him of the entourage waiting out side. Vorador was unloading the first of many kegs into the tomb proper. Gently settling the massive barrel in a clear patch of floor he returned to the narrow doorway to receive the next of the many deliveries.

"And to think… Last time I just settled for hog-tying half a village's worth of peasants to the wall." Kain drawled as Vorador returned with yet another barrel.

The vampire grunted and set his load down next to the first few. "No need to massacre the valley and announce ourselves to all and sundry. We stopped the Saraphan from destroying the blood fountains, so we might as well use them."

"Call me old fashioned, Vorador, but I'd still rather my children fed first on live prey." Kain mused. "There's something so very _docile_ about drinking from a magical puddle by comparison."

Vorador merely rolled his eyes and turned to offer assistance as his maker wriggled through the low doorway. Janos' wings didn't make his entrance any easier. In the end the blue skinned vampire was obliged to shuffle in backwards, his long appendages stretched to minimize their vertical dimension. Kain ducked an outstretched wing and resisted the urge to smack at it in annoyance. Finally able to stand upright, Janos soon had himself contained more tidily, looking around with calm interest before giving Kain a semi-irritated look.

"I've no doubt that you'll have your brood ravaging humanity soon enough." To his credit, Janos managed to critique without sarcasm. "Despite your prejudices, the fountain's powers are usually superior to that of a live captive, especially an unwilling one."

Looking down at one of the corpses, the ancient's face took on a pained expression. "Of course, it is your blood that will have to be strong enough to recall them to life in the first place. There isn't much to work with, is there…"

"You doubt my strength?" Kain chuckled. "There's potential enough with these knights, even now. But I confess, the fact that the sarcophaguses are lined with foil ought to expedite things nicely."

"Indeed." Vorador was inured to their moral squabbling and simply ignored it in favor of more practical concerns. "It'll be far easier to just pour than to try and lift these bones without doing further damage." Looking around, the green vampire nodded in satisfaction. "A bit cramped, but it will do nicely. I've set some of the more capable youngsters to patrolling the valley. I think you've picked an unusually fine night for your labors, Kain."

"Naturally," He smirked. Fussing with the closest keg, he tried to keep from feeling awkward about performing in front of an audience. Unlike his fellow vampire lords, who had between them and their cabal engendered every vampire currently at large in the world, the number of fledglings he could lay claim to totaled a measly twelve through out the entire span of history. Even then, only three of them belonged to this timeline. Still three were enough practice to keep the process of resurrection fresh in his memory. And what had once been done, could certainly be done again. He approached the matter with more confidence than he might have the first time.

Gently taping the top of the first keg, he crushed the thin wooden end planks inwards and then plucked them out and dropped them on the floor. The heady smell of fresh blood immediately filled the room. Kain looked to his old ally, gesturing that Vorador would take his position. "You'll do me the honor of decanting?"

"I wouldn't miss it." The large vampire feigned a bow. "Which first?"

"Raziel, of course." Kain surprised himself with being annoyed. As if the question even had to be asked? But again, Vorador would have no knowledge of particulars. In all the world, only he walked every moment with the sensation that he was repeating himself. To everyone else, each day was a novelty. He shook his head at the tedium of it all. "Raziel, then Turel, Dumah, Rahab, and so forth around the circle."

Nodding, Vorador took his mood swings in stride. He positioned several of the casks for his later convenience. "I still think you mad, Kain, for attempting six all in the same night. But I'm ready when you are."

"You say that as if I've ever done anything the easy way," Kain laughingly replied. He dispensed with his clan cloak and arm bracers to expose bare skin as he considered the task before him. Raising the Saraphan in mass was possible; he'd done it before after all. But this time he wanted to make an effort to correct what had been, the first-time, an error of distribution. He wasn't above doing what he could to see that his less irritating children received a greater portion of his gift than they had the first time. Especially if it meant poor Melchiah would be able to keep his skin together in his old age. It was not a trivial thing. Kain remembered how exhausting the bloodletting became towards the end.

Staring down at his first-born's sour features, Kain had to smirk. At least this one wouldn't be difficult. If he erred with the others, it would be a pity but not a crucial loss. He dug his claws into his wrist with a grimace and forced the blood to flow. Holding his maimed limb out over Raziel's casket he concentrated his will on the task at hand. Using his own life-force he called on his once and future ally, searching for his spirit amidst the ruined and wasted flesh being bathed in his blood, compelling it to resume its former home. The Soul Reaver on his hip twitched anxiously in response to his summons, but imprisoned in the steel's grip, the spirit within the blade could not obey. Nor did it need to, for another spirit imbued the corpse in answer to his call. Kain felt the flicker of a long familiar aura, faint but immediately recognizable, from the still form. Once again Kain found himself in awe of his favorite's dual nature. In an odd way it made sense. Like the old liturgy went. One to have, and one to hold; he smirked at his mental mis-phrase.

The corpse shuddered as blood splashed over dry lips and cheeks. Fueled by the vampiric curse and the spirit's hunger, the ichors readily flowed against gravity, soaking into the slowly awakening knight. Weighing his remaining strength against the five coffins left, Kain was still reluctant to step aside for Vorador quite yet. More and more of his dark gift flowed into the reviving corpse until finally he forced himself to clamp down on his wound, confident that life had firmly taken root. The old vampire at his side rolled up his fine linen sleeves to hoist the open keg aloft even as Raziel's withered mouth opened in a soundless scream of hunger. Gently tipping the contents, Vorador completely submerged the half-alive corpse in a soothing bath of magic-enhanced blood. With no lungs yet to breathe, the body in the coffin stilled and lay passive as its immediate need was satiated. Eying the fluid level as the blood was slowly absorbed, Vorador nodded calmly and moved on to the next cask.

Kain watched the unremarkable pool of blood that filled Raziel's casket for a moment as well, but it was too soon to attempt to judge the result of his handiwork. It would be hours, or even days before his first-born was anything but a mindless litch in need of feeding. Standing over Turel, he reopened the cuts in his arm and began the process again, a little more miserly than before. Despite his desire to conserve strength, the large knight took a lot of blood to awaken. As methodical and grudging in this as in everything else he did. Kain cursed the fool as he moved quickly on to his next target.

One by one he progressed around the room. Each corpse became more and more of a trial. Out of the corner of his eye, Kain saw Janos move to assist Vorador, picking up a barrel of his own in order to refill the depleted blood pools of Raziel and Turel. He pushed dizziness aside as he concentrated on Melchiah's resurrection. The chill of extreme anemia was already making his muscles weak, but he was confident that he would accomplish his task better than before. Kain didn't feel badly for stinting Zephon and the others a little of their share. Their relative weakness would not be apparent to anyone but him. Dumah and Turel would still be more than strong enough for the wars he would set the vampires to win. Rahab and the others' greatest assets had always been their strategic minds.

Looking down at the opaque surface of the blood filling his second youngest's coffin he regretted the necessity of raising the vampire at all. Five lieutenants would have served as well as six and he never did like Zephon's waspish tongue. But six lieutenants was what he had started with, and six was what he would settle for now. Kain had a feeling that he would need the complete set. Even the less interesting ones had their purpose. If he had found himself capable of living with a century of Sebastian's idiocy, he could certainly put up with future inconveniences. Once the empire was settled, he could easily farm his more irritating offspring off into the wilds of the frontier with promises of glory and kingdoms of their own. Let them be a headache to someone else for a century or two.

A final cask of blood had been kindly left in the center of the room for Kain, he noticed as he turned from his labors. He couldn't bring himself to even pretend to hesitate. His skin itched with the need to replenish what he had so freely spent on others. Bracing himself on the rim of the barrel to keep from tipping into the drink entirely, he sank his face into the refreshing liquid and gorged himself like a fledgling. It was only when the level of blood in the cask had dropped to a degree that he could not conveniently reach that he leaned back to wipe his chin. One of the empty casks had been tipped up to make a table for him, a large goblet waiting for him to remember himself enough to eat in a civilized fashion. Kain claimed the vessel, forbearing to comment on the hypocrisy of 'civilized' for a race which needed to sup on the blood of the living to sustain itself. He was still hungry, and debating with Janos was an exercise in futility. Sipping the rest of his meal slowly, Kain considered his handiwork for the night.

The tomb looked like the inside of a demented butcher's shop, spilled and sloshed blood was painted about the room in a colorful display. He made a mental note to have the worst of it scraped up and cleared away before they sealed the chamber again, not that he expected any of the evidence of the night's handiwork to last into the next century, much less as long as it would take for any of his children to grow old enough to question their origins.

Janos tipped out the last of his barrel's contents over Rahab's coffin as Kain looked on. There was another wagon's worth of blood in the camp, but that was provisions for Vorador's flock outside, not to mention meals for his own hungry little family. Watching the level of blood still sinking steadily in Raziel's coffin, Kain wondered if maybe he shouldn't encourage Vorador to send the now empty wagon off to get another load. He hadn't remembered needing so much of the stuff the first time. But for all he knew, the fledglings had been half starved for their first few weeks of life. At the time he had been too exhausted to fetch them more food or truly, to care at all whether they were comfortable or not. As soon as the pitiful wretches were animate enough to walk, he had marched them off to the nearest village and let them feed themselves. For a moment he pitied that long gone hamlet. Being at the mercy of half-mad fledglings suffering from blood lust was a messy way to die.

His children were adapting to their new situation as befitted their natures. Most lay calmly, only semi aware, in their comfortable bath. Others were already twitching and shifting mindlessly as their strength returned. A blood soaked glove slipped weakly along the edge of Turel's casket before sinking back beneath the surface. Kain looked down at Raziel, curious to see the corpse's reaction to its new state. The fluid was almost low enough to make out the knight's features. The corners of Raziel's surcoat floated wetly to the surface. The new vampire seemed unconcerned, lying calmly as he regenerated, seemingly asleep.

"Best to let them absorb their fill, I think." Vorador joined him in his study. "I'll have a fresh load sent for tomorrow to feed the children outside, they can spare a barrel or two more for one night."

"My thoughts as well." Kain agreed, exhaustion catching up with him now that his stomach was full.

"Time for us to rest then." His companions eyed him with concern. "The guards will alert us should we be needed here or elsewhere. We shall take our turn at watch during the day when the younger ones are compelled to sleep."

"I'll stay here." Kain wiped sticky hands along a rag thoughtfully provided. "I've slept in worse places. You two go ahead and settle yourselves in the camp."

Not waiting to hear their response, Kain settled himself against the wall, uncaring of dust and funerary debris, and closed his eyes to nap. Later he was certain he had found unconsciousness before he had drawn two breaths.


	11. Chapter 11

Kain partially awakened to a wet slopping sort of noise, and for a minute his tired brain was convinced it was a dream brought on by over indulging. A second splash, followed by a wet cough brought him fully back to consciousness. It took only a cursory glance about his surroundings to remember what he had been up to before sleep. But in the hours since he had closed his eyes, it was apparent that at least one of his children had progressed to a point of nominal mobility. Kain leaned sideways to see beyond the corner of the doorway. At the end of the narrow passage he could easily make out the rich light of late morning shafting down through the treetops.

Vorador must have let him oversleep. Kain smirked, mentally noting the kindhearted gesture for a proper teasing later. The gruff vampire was altogether nursemaid-like in his tendencies towards others of his tribe. No one who had ever seen the man on the battlefield could have guessed that the blood-thirsty fiend of their nightmares could be so soft hearted. Not that Vorador wasn't an unrepentant sensualist when it came to his personal habits and hobbies, but it was a rare woman whom once seduced seemed to mind terribly.

As vampires, the girls had both freedom and power beyond the dreams of the average villager or townswoman. Even when Vorador's eye roved inevitably to his next paramour, the women he left behind were never truly abandoned. If anything their shared experience in loving and loosing the vampire lord made them band together all the tighter with their sisters. Kain couldn't fathom the idea of having an entire retinue of ex-lovers rolling their eyes at him as he attempted to court a new face, but somehow the heckling never seemed to bother his ally. If anything he relished the backhanded affection of his women's fond harassment.

Thinking of Vorador made him wonder what the old bastard was up to. The three of them were supposed to be minding the camp while the others slept, but there was no sign that the vampire lords were out and about. Reaching out with his thoughts he quickly ascertained that the green vampire was conversing idly with his maker. Janos's attention was focused wholly on whatever it was they were discussing, but Vorador spared him a momentary greeting, confirming that the woods were as quiet as they seemed. Kain withdrew and let the pair continue their discussion as he resumed his comfortable slouch against the wall. He was awake, but not entirely ready to be. His limbs still felt somewhat weak as his body recovered from its unusual abuse the night before. Rubbing his face to inspire a little more alertness, Kain turned to consider what had rudely awaken him.

Raziel. He sighed, recognizing the wobbling casket. Of course.

Raziel seemed to have completed the initial phase of his regeneration. The fledgling was clumsily seeking escape from his now congealed and uncomfortable resting place even as Kain watched in disbelief. Before he could muster the energy to assist, his first-born managed to coordinate his movements enough to find his own way to freedom. The blood-soaked knight dragged himself over the edge of his casket by inches until the shifting of his meager weight proved too much for the box. It tipped, spilling its owner and the last of the dusty sludge it contained onto the tomb floor with a wet thud and subsequent clatter. The momentum of his fall caused Raziel to roll to a stop, helmet and weapons scattered as he lay wheezing softly in pain. Another abortive cough showed that his newly reconstructed lungs were ready and wanting to clear themselves of obstruction. The fledgling curled weakly onto his side and shuddered as his body fought with his attempt at any further movement.

"Foolish child. Why so impatient?" Kain groaned as he stood up, joints complaining at the ill treatment they had suffered in the past twenty-four hours. "It's practically mid-day. All good little fledglings ought to be damn near comatose."

It wasn't like his newest child would understand his commentary. At this point in his resurrection, the fledgling probably didn't have the intelligence of a village idiot. Rationality would come towards the end of the tedious process of regeneration. While capable of movement, the wretched vampire looked only marginally better than the corpse he had inspected the evening before.

'Alive' was pretty much the best Kain could say in favor of his favorite son at that moment. He crouched at the pitiful creature's side even as the grey fingers slid clumsily along the dusty floor. Raziel seemed either unaware, or unaffected by the hour. Despite all odds he was mindlessly attempting to shift himself again. It was impossible to guess what impulse the newly awakened soul was trying to follow, but Kain wasn't about to let the fool go staggering outside only to be blasted to cinders on contact with sunlight. He had plans for Raziel in the near future that required the vampire being in one piece. Blessedly, the grey skin was no longer fragile as he reached out a hand to stay the fledgling's movements. Having absorbed a good bit of the moisture that the blood provided, the infant vampire's limbs were bone-thin but solid beneath his claws. Kain rolled his wayward fledgling onto his back to keep him from creeping off and checked the knight over for any injury done by his slight fall.

The infant vampire wheezed and blinked up at him, instinctively wary of his presence even if incapable of mounting any sort of a defense against a larger predator in his current state. Raziel's dark hair was likely still a matted ruin, but it looked black and tidy, slicked to his skull thanks to his recent soak. His eyes, barely open, were also nearly complete, already a semi-luminescent yellow. Kain murmured a scolding at his child before standing and stretching his back, considering the room at large. There was no doubt that the vampire would finish his regeneration ahead of schedule. He didn't have any memory of Raziel being unduly early compared to the others, in his previous life, why the boy was up and creeping about when only half-reassembled was a little perplexing.

Kain glanced at the other innocent-looking coffins near by and wondered exactly how much extra he had given his first child compared to the others. It hadn't seemed like much at the time. But the other coffin's occupants lay as still as the dead, content to sleep through the day without mishap. Then again, there was the strength of the soul itself to consider as part of the equation. He looked down at the fledgling lying before him with a healthy appreciation of what Raziel was capable of when willing to exert himself.

It was not impossible that the spirit remembered something of its past experiences. If anyone could overcome the amnesia of death and rebirth, surely it would be the creature before him. He shook his head at the impossibility of it. The so-called 'Elder god' would hardly allow that to happen.

Stooping to grip the frail looking body as gently as possible, Kain lifted the fledgling up and settled him, dripping as he was, against his bare shoulder. The body was still feather light despite its prolonged soaking. It took all of two steps to cross the room and resume his earlier resting place against the wall. A moment longer and he had settled his irksome child in an almost comfortable huddle in his lap.

Raziel was all sharp elbows and uncoordinated knees still, but it was clear to see where muscle and fat was returning to the withered frame. Kain watched idly as the tracery of ligaments along the fledgling's arm slowly became more pronounced. The body against his trembled as nerve endings and vessels reformed along his limbs. As interesting as the process was, Kain couldn't deny he was still in need of another nap. Tucked firmly against his shoulder, his new child seemed less inclined to struggle. Raziel simply shivered passively as the vampiric curse worked its sinister restoration. The scent of stale blood drying on his skin was far from appetizing.

"You need a proper bath, child." Kain critiqued, mostly for his own entertainment as he sought to return to unconsciousness. "Remind me to have some of Vorador's wives tend to you when I wake, would you?" Even emaciated and insensible, the comfortable feeling of Raziel's presence against him was enough lull him back to sleep.

8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8

The next time Kain awoke it was with the assistance of Vorador's toe claws digging gently into his calf. He hissed half heartedly at his ally, rousing himself with difficulty. The fur clad vampire simply looked down at him in amusement.

"Noon, Kain. I thought you might be hungry."

"I'm up." Blinking the last of his sleep away, Kain shifted his sleeping companion enough to get a better look at the fledgling. There was no evidence now of the odd wakefulness that had driven the fool to crawl out of his sarcophagus. Completely comatose, Raziel put up no resistance to his gentle probing. Only hours had slipped by, but already the vampire was looking more like himself to Kain's jaded eye. The fledgling's skin was rapidly filling out and gaining faint hints of color; the hollows between his ribs and at the base of his neck less pronounced. The vampire looked merely three-quarters starved now, not skeletal.

"So. Did he find his way across the room on his own? Or did he have help." Vorador couldn't keep the amusement out of his question.

Kain shot him a sour look. "He found his way to the floor at any rate. I thought it best to pin him down before he got it into his addled head to go out for a stroll."

"Odd that you never mentioned before now how pretty he was. Or rather he will be, once he's fed up a little." Vorador crouched to get a better look, grinning widely. "Just look at those cheekbones. Umah will be after him for sure."

The green vampire looked at him drolly, unable to resist one last dig. "But then I guess I'm not surprised. You've always favored the handsome ones yourself, haven't you? Sebastian had little else going for him as I recall."

Kain resisted the urge to strangle his oldest ally for his perception. It was no use denying the vampire. Vorador was not wholly off the mark. The first time he had raised Sebastian, there had indeed been a time when the nobleman had served as more than mere agent.

But that was a long time ago, longer then bore contemplating. The idea of re-enacting that particular bit of adolescent stupidity had never even crossed his mind back in Meridian. And even if he had wanted to, he was hardly the young and supposedly attractive man of his youth. Sebastian would have recoiled at the very idea. Even Umah or any of his once-upon-a-time lovers less-shallow would probably think twice before embracing his scarred old carcass now. Mind, body and spirit were centuries more world-weary now, and more the better. Not for the first time, he shook his head at his past antics.

Attempting to dissuade Vorador from the idea of Raziel as his paramour would only encourage the vampire to tease him further. He settled for deflecting the letch instead. "Rest assured, this one's generally accepted physical appeal will not have any bearing on his competence in battle." Kain shifted the scrawny fledgling slightly against his shoulder to allow himself to stretch properly.

"And for your reference, as a human I wouldn't have called him particularly enticing. Firstly he was Moebius' lackey, and we've met their type before. Secondly, the fashion of the time - if you recall five centuries ago - involved rouge for men and ludicrously overdone clothing." He gestured at the overly stylized ancient armor that still hung off the fledgling in places.

Vorador snorted in amusement, remembering the useless fashions that swept Nosgoth over the centuries. "Did he go that way? I suppose as a 'pretty boy' of that era he would have been obliged to, even as a crusader. I'm surprised that none of the others had their hair in ringlets." The old vampire stood to investigate the other caskets.

"Ah well, this lot seem stable enough for now." Vorador spoke at last, grinning down at Kain as he returned from his inspection. "And blessedly, they won't remember their fashion faux pas when they awake, or anything else for that matter. Six fledglings with the instincts of generals to join in our fight against the Hylden; positively inspired, Kain. And a little insane. Just as expected from you. Let's hope they prove more faithful than your last bunch."

"I have every expectation of even the worst of them being better in every way than my first bits of baggage." Kain remarked acidly, silently grateful that Vorador had changed the subject. Shifting his sleeping burden until Raziel was curled on the floor instead of against him, he stood and rolled his shoulders. The vault's floor was smooth polished, but his old bones were still inclined to complain at napping unpadded all night. His recent stay at Vorador's mansion had softened him a little, he mused.

Raziel seemed content to continue drowsing. He weighed the odds of the boy reawakening when he left against his desire to stretch his legs. What ever his motivations of the morning, the youth was behaving as expected now. Kain told himself to stop worrying, in need of some fresh air. Doing a bit of a sweep of the woods nearby was a convenient way of both clearing his lungs and escaping Vorador's cynical commentary. The Saraphan Order might be defeated, but there were still plenty of other groups at large in the world who wouldn't hesitate to attack a camp of resting vampires. Nodding his greeting to Janos as he passed the ancient vampire at the mouth of the crypt he didn't hesitate to step out into the dappled sunlight and down into the valley. The pair of vampire lords could see to the infants for an hour or two while he explored the valley.

8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8

The forest was uncommonly peaceful. Early autumn color was starting to show even in the protected lowlands. Various small creatures scurried at his arrival, interrupted in their foraging by his soft footsteps. Kain followed a game trail that wound down and towards the nearest river, crouching to feel the soil as the trees gave way to watercourse and meadow.

Further down along the edge of the lazy little river, a tightly constructed stockade fence line warned him of the human settlement nearby. The mortals near Vorador's forest were somewhat resigned to vampires wandering out of the trees, but that didn't mean they extended an open invitation to nighttime visitors to stop in and dine. Vampire gold spent as well as anyone else's however, and the small village had profited by their dealings with his army enough that their relations weren't entirely disagreeable. During the day, the humans had precious little to fear by all accounts.

With overlords more interested with eating the local bandits, than their grain, the villagers had plenty to keep them occupied beyond their tidy stockade while the sun was up. Washerwomen were down along the shore merrily gossiping as they went about their business. Some young human was whistling as he pushed a barrow down the lane leading to the fields. Kain could hear them and the dozens of other noises of village life from his hiding place, vampiric senses honed by years of practice. He crouched and listened simply for the sake of it, inspecting the well-kempt roads and healthy peasantry with a proprietary fondness.

The humble settlement belonged to him as much as the woods or the ruins did. He had the time, and the ability to see to what few needs the mortals had. Strangers to the valley might remark on the hardship of living so close to the vampire stronghold, but the villages under his protection rarely suffered from droughts or pestilence. If they poached a few deer from the edges of the forest, he wasn't about to claim a boy's hand in revenge. His inspection revealed nothing worrying. The fields were waist high with grain, and the livestock frisked in the sunshine.

He burrowed his fingers idly in the soil between his feet, the unconscious habit of a previous life hard to break. The loam his claws sifted through was dense and rich smelling, a pleasant change from the dusty withered land he had walked through for two times ten centuries. Every time he absently checked, he was pleased again by the vitality he could sense in the world.

Scooping up a fistful, he rubbed at the blood flecks still clinging to his claws and arm from where Raziel had been napping, scrubbing until only the smell of the dirt remained. Dusting off the soil he sighed, realizing he was due himself for a bath. The smell was much improved, but now his arm was a noticeable shade of brown.

He shrugged at his own foolishness. There would be time for ablutions and more once he returned to camp. For the moment he chose to continue downstream, away from the village, to see what else he could observe of his tiny kingdom.

An urgent mental whisper from Vorador distracted him as he was strolling further down the valley. Curious, Kain headed back to the tomb site and all but walked head-on into the band of humans that the vampire lord had warned him were in the area.

The bandits never saw him, oblivious, like all mortals to his mist form. But Kain sighed quietly just the same as he rematerialized behind a tree. He was too old for such antics. Watching their progress he decided that the band of thieves was both terribly lucky and also terribly incurious about their surroundings. None of them noted the disturbed brush along the edges of the trail, or the obvious wagon tracks.

Following a little behind he listened to their conversation, learning that they were passing through the mountains in search of rich prey on the Great Southern Highway. Seeing as they meant no harm to the sleepy hamlet nearby, he was inclined to let them. The merchant caravans had outriders for just this reason. As the road was not yet part of his domain he had no reason to police it just now.

Kain pondered scavenging one of the more laggardly criminals from the back of the group to supplement his offspring's diet however. It wouldn't do to have humans feeling _too_ comfortable when crossing vampire territory. Janos wouldn't approve. He sighed again and let the bandits slip out of sight, the joy in the kill lost by the foreknowledge of his peaceable ally's complaints.

The sun was already heading towards the horizon as he walked back into camp. Distant mountains cast their shadow across the valley and made it seem later for the vampires still taking their rest. Several of Vorador's elder children were already up and about, taking over the duties of setting up watches and dispensing food. Never particularly amused by small talk with the young ones, he nodded at the various greetings but didn't pause until he had maneuvered his way back to the crypt.

Torches burned brightly in the subterranean chamber, welcoming him in. Some thoughtful soul had cleared the empty casks while he was out, and tidied up some of the armor and debris. But otherwise the tomb was exactly as he'd left it. Kain wasn't particularly surprised to see that his misfit fledgling was once again awake.

"Precocious, aren't you." He couldn't help but remark.

Raziel watched him with unabashed curiosity, clearly distracted from the task that had captivated him a moment ago. Kain returned the fledgling's gaze with one of his own, standing quietly in order to see what the newly resurrected knight would do. The new vampire looked nearly complete, if still gaunt. But while there was intelligence in the creature's looks, he couldn't call it self-awareness yet. Some final delicate repairs to brain tissue were likely still in progress as the curse finished its work.

Kain was duly impressed with the boy's progress compared to the corpse he had been that morning. Raziel was soon bored with watching him however, and returned to doodling random lines in the dust on the floor, pausing occasionally to itch at the dried blood on his hands. Kain left him to it, curious about the progress of the others.

The other five fledglings had progressed as well, each of them now recognizable despite their thin faces. Turel slept fitfully, jaw twitching as he slowly dried in his box. Melchiah's chest rose and fell steadily with each breath. Dumah had managed to fling one armored arm up partially covering his eyes as if irritated by the dim light, but he too slept. Kain found the last two much in the same condition, and was well pleased with the developments. He turned back to his most interesting child to see what Raziel found so amusing in playing in the dust.

Crouching next to his first-born, Kain felt a moment's chill as he looked down at the childish drawings. The spiral pattern Raziel favored was simple but compelling. Interspersed between the circular shapes were some crude hourglass-like curves. The fledgling seemed much focused on them, drawing the pair of shapes again and again.

It had been a while, but he could hardly forget the last time he saw those particular symbols paired together. The events at the base of Moebius' citadel were indelibly etched in his memory. Both were references to the beast lurking amongst the roots of the world. Reaching out, Kain caught the vampire's fingers in his grip, lifting them from their latest drawing. "Enough, child. Enough."

Raziel looked at him and then his captured hand; neither offended nor startled by the interruption. There was no recognition in the innocent gaze. Kain grimly forbid himself from any feeling of disappointment.

To become a vampire was to start with a clean slate, unencumbered by any joys or disappointments of a previous life. Only he and Vorador seemed to have any ability to remember their origins, and neither of them had been created by exactly conventional means. The memory of awaking half-alive in Moritanius' sanctum still gave him nightmares from time to time. As for Vorador, the green vampire seldom spoke of his early life of training under they last vestiges of Janos' civilization. He couldn't imagine reminiscence over what he had lost with the Crusades brought Vorador any joy.

Raziel was spared both nightmare and regret by the amnesia of rebirth. Kain tried to tell himself it was for the best. There was time enough in this new and green Nosgoth for the vampire to indulge in a little fledgling innocence before being obliged to become the man he would inevitably grow into. Still, there must have been _something_ of his Raziel's nature left in the child's addled brain. Why else draw such unmistakable warnings with his first waking moments?

"Your soul remembers. Even if you do not." Kain sighed, feeling his age. "Have no fear child, you will not be obliged to return to that monster for some time if I have any say in the matter."

Considering carefully the potential future the fledgling was about to live, Kain realized that Raziel, of all people, would likely never come face to face with the false god again. He grimaced as he contemplated the vampire's alternative arrangements. Being imprisoned for eternity in a sword was hardly a better answer.

Raziel ignored his words entirely, far more interested in his three-fingered hand than anything he might say. For a moment Kain humored the fledgling, allowing the knight to claim his hand and investigate his claws. Eventually the poking became irritating and he pulled back to consider his options. Something would have to be done to keep the vampire occupied while they waited for sanity to return. With the others seemingly content to sleep the night away and regenerate at a more leisurely pace, there was no reason for anyone to rush.

Kain examined the remaining cask at the center of the room and found it still half full. The fountain's magical properties were waning with every hour the blood was separate from the spring, but there was still enough enchantment left to have kept the life giving drink from going stale. He found his dropped goblet and dipped a portion for himself before refilling it and approaching the first coffin. It was a tedious process to pour a cup full down each of his sleeping lieutenants' throats, but it served to calm the more restless of the sleepers. Finally he stooped to retrieve one last goblet full for his most precocious child, only to turn and see that Janos had silently arrived to beat him to it.

The ancient crouched beside Raziel, supporting the base of the vessel as the young vampire drank, ignoring the fledgling's uncoordinated attempts to support the cup himself. Kain ruthlessly suppressed the moment of seething jealousy before Janos could pick up on the ugly feeling. He could hardly tear into the ancient for being helpful. It wasn't fair to the creature to blame him for the partiality that a different Raziel had shown centuries ago. Kain just dearly wished that the ancient vampire would be helpful with _someone else_. He had no intention of relinquishing the best and brightest of his offspring to the old one just to have him be raised to be a mealy mouthed bore.

Only hours old, Kain realized, watching Raziel wipe his mouth and proceed to treat Janos with the same calm indifference he used with everything so far. Only hours old and already he couldn't help but feel possessive of the vampire. The others might go to hell if they wished; take up basket weaving; join with the enemy. Raziel was _his_. Had been and always would be.

Forgotten was the apathy he had felt for the fledgling on their first meeting. Knowing full well what the man before him was capable of, Kain was more resolved than ever to set things right. With Raziel all things were possible, for Raziel was still destined to be free. Even now there was an echo of the unknown surrounding the fledgling. The Pillars sang in the back of his mind as he probed the question. Did Raziel still possess some element of the un-choreographed fate he had once laid claim to? Something was different about the fledgling, compared with the others, but neither the Pillars, nor he himself were sure what it was.

This time things would be different. He felt the resolution within his bones. This time his first-born would never be left in the dark as to his worth, or be badgered with questions of loyalty. Kain already knew the answers to all of the mysteries that had once plagued him regarding the handsome fledgling. There weren't any doubts. He shook his head in dismay as he watched Janos fuss over the youth. If he wasn't careful, he would end up spoiling his child beyond salvation. Or, more likely, Janos would probably beat him to it. Some measures would have to be taken to prevent Audron and the others from coddling the child too much, Kain sighed, if only to keep him from grinding his teeth every time the ancient tried to speak with him.

"Janos." He resisted the urge to bark at the vampire when the sage moved to finger-comb Raziel's caked hair. "Do you mind?"

The graying vampire looked up innocently, ignoring the implicit scolding. "Is it not amazing, Kain? How quickly he progresses? I would not have thought it possible had I not seen it with my own eyes."

"Dazzling, I assure you." He replied dryly. His claws twitched at the way Janos smiled in delight at his child's curious hand on his feathers. Tossing the sage out of the tomb by his wings was hardly politic. Considering everything, it wouldn't do for the boy's first conscious memory of his sire to be Kain throttling his once-and-probably-future mentor in a fit of jealous rage. Still he could hardly stand by and do nothing. The blue skinned fool was already fussing with the fledgling's hair again.

He closed his eyes and counted to ten.

"Stop pestering the child, Janos?" He felt secretly happy at the older vampire's wounded look. "You're going to give him a complex if you keep manhandling him like that."

"He's conscious, Kain." Janos was not above gently scolding back. "Someone ought to be making him feel welcome. Not just leaving him down here by himself all night. He'll be far happier regaining a sense-of-self in camp where he can be seen to properly."

"The noise and groping he'll likely receive out there will probably only confuse him." Kain disagreed. "It's more peaceful here. Besides, I want to keep an eye on him. He woke too soon for my tastes. Something might have gone awry."

Janos sniffed, strangely stubborn about relinquishing his hold on the fledgling. "I think I am eminently qualified, Kain, to diagnose any problems that might arise with Raziel's development. I have quite a few fledglings of my own, as you know."

"Never one like this." Kain muttered, mostly to himself. Still he could hardly rebut the declaration. The blue skinned ancient had embraced more vampires than he could number. There was no doubt that if anyone could claim resident-expert status on fledglings, it would have to be Janos. It gave Kain a somewhat unfair, but perfectly acceptable way to win the argument however. He acted on it immediately, feeling happier even as he spoke.

"Truly, Janos, you are a blessing in disguise. I don't know how I ever could have managed this lot without the assistance you and Vorador have kindly provided. I wouldn't feel comfortable leaving my kin to be tended by any hands less worthy. But since you're here, I am confident that my absence will do no harm as I see about cleaning this one up."

Leaving Janos to puzzle through his meaning, Kain wasted no time in gently hauling Raziel upright. When it was clear the fledgling's weak legs wouldn't support him, he expedited the transfer by scooping Raziel up bodily and carrying him from the crypt.

"Mind Dumah's fists." He called back through the opening at the startled sage. "He has no concept of aiming yet, but his strength is already formidable."

Kain crossed the camp quickly with his tattered burden, thankful that Raziel seemed content to be carried. The man's head easily fit against his neck, his breath tickling his jaw as he drew an assortment of curious stares. Most of Vorador's brood seemed to be vying for a first glimpse of their newest cousin. Raziel stared back, undismayed, as curious about the camp as he seemed interested in everything.

Kain recognized two of Vorador's older 'wives' as he passed and hoped that with age came some nominal amount of self-control. "If the two of you would assist? I believe some grooming is in order." Bowing their heads in acknowledgement, the women rose and followed him into the tent.

Luckily, the females seemed to know their business. Kain felt ridiculous enough holding onto the fledgling without having to give orders at the same time. He settled for sternly looking on while they prepared the low tub and gathered the necessary towels. The dark haired one gestured that he might deposit his burden in the assigned location while she unstoppered the first of many flasks of herb infused oil. He couldn't help but grimace at the strong smell.

"We either brought this, or bought fresh milk from the village." She replied to his unspoken disapproval. "Milk spoils."

"Carry on." He accepted the logical argument and retreated to a canvas chair to oversee the proceeding. In good time the rags and blood caked armor were cut away leaving the fledgling bare-skinned for washing. With him glaring, the pair could hardly coo appreciatively over the already handsome vampire as they readied soap and oil. Kain couldn't complain that the women were anything less than capable as they proceed to thoroughly scrub and wipe away any trace of grime. Through the whole process, Raziel sat perfectly at ease. Other than sub vocalizing once as a particularly painful looking mat was combed of his hair, he allowed the manhandling without protest. Dried, dressed, and guided to sit on a nearby pile of cushions, Vorador's wives completed their assigned task and proceeded out of the tent to rinse the tub for their next subject.

Raziel watched them leave with interest. But like a cat, paid them no mind once they were out of sight. The fledgling began a careful inspection of his shirt cuffs while Kain looked on in amusement.

The oil was of a light enough pressing that it left only a faint sheen behind after toweling was done. Normally Kain did not favor the method of bathing, but seeing the result he concluded that the women were entirely right. Raziel's newly clipped and combed hair would be well served by the softening properties of the oil, and his rejuvenated skin could only benefit as well. All together he looked far more healthy, if such an adjective could be applied to a vampire, than he had before.

Kain rose from his chair and crouched next to his fledgling, curious to see how the boy would react. Ignored, he was obliged to capture the fledgling's fingers again to draw his attention. He sighed, irritated by the vampire's simple-minded fascination with anything and everything. "Stop that."

Again, the sound of his voice had the power to compel. Raziel immediately turned towards him, studying his face with a searching expression. Something had changed behind his eyes. Kain couldn't help but reach out to gently catch the vampire by the chin, holding his gaze. "Do you know me, child?"

Raziel stared at him a moment before lifting his own – so human- hand to mimic his gesture. Kain almost flinched at the feel of the fledgling's fingers lightly resting on his face. He had grown out of the habit of being touched, but even that wasn't what startled him. The impulse refused to be defined or labeled. Fading even as he sought to better understand what it was. The Reaver, belted as ever across his back, sighed softly in response. Forcing himself to relax, Kain allowed the impertinent gesture, puzzled equally by his sword and child alike; hardly surprising as they were one and the same.

The contact only lasted a moment. Raziel was soon distracted by his clan cloak, fingers leaving his skin in favor of gingerly plucking at one edge of the worn fabric. Sitting back, Kain unbuckled his cape and pulled it off so his child might see it better.

"Look carefully, Raziel." He counseled. "Look well and remember it. For it is your destiny. This is my imperial standard, both past and future. I created it at the dawn of my ambition to rally those who could aid me to my cause, and to strike fear into those who dared oppose me. It could be said that I created you for much the same reason."

Raziel stared at him in calm and possibly uncomprehending acceptance.

"I am Kain, child. Your lord and master." He smiled slightly at the future that lay ahead of them. "Together, we shall conquer the world someday, you and I."

8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8

For a night Raziel prowled around camp by himself, exploring the boundaries of his new existence. Alternately preoccupied with his eldest's development and the slower recovery of the rest of his fledglings, Kain divided his time between camp and catacomb. Even when focused on the others, he felt Raziel's proximity. The fledgling seemed equally sensitive to his presence, seeking him out if left in Vorador and the other's company too long. When day broke he returned to his tent only to find the boy curled up on his rug like a stray rather then on the cot at the far side of the space someone has set out for him. Kain shook his head in bemused wonder at the child's stubborn whimsy, stooping to drape a blanket over the vampire's thin shoulders before settling the Reaver in its stand by his bed. An hour of rest and he was up again, inspecting his wayward fledgling for any sign of wakefulness before shifting him up onto the bed and leaving him to sleep out the remains of the day.

Dusk brought a flurry of activity yet again. This time several of the crypt's occupants stirring, ready to venture forth into the world. Turning from a conversation with one of Vorador's wives about the progress of his little flock, Kain found himself yet again under observation. His liveliest offspring was a scrawny addition to the shadows next to his tent. Dismissing the woman back to her duties, he held out a hand, silently inviting Raziel to join him. Quick as a cat the boy was at his side, pacing a circle around him before allowing himself to be touched. Kain caught the side of his head in a gentle cuff before giving into the temptation to ruffle the fledgling's hair. Raziel ducked and playfully endeavored to avoid him, while at the same time never entirely slipping beyond his reach. It was a childish game, but something in the boy's eyes hinted that he was entirely aware of it.

"Have you eaten?" He asked. Not surprised when the vampire nodded in assent to his question. That Raziel understood the conversation around him was clear even in the hours before dawn. He simply didn't choose to participate in it.

"Will you not speak?" He chided as Raziel ducked his touch yet again, trailing after him as he returned to the tomb where his brothers stirred. As endearing as Raziel's laughing looks were, Kain found he missed the sound of his child's voice. For reasons known only to him however, the fledgling maintained his silence. Distracted from his worries about Raziel by Janos' greeting Kain alternately scolded and encouraged the rest of his still-addled little family out of their now-unnecessary resting place and into the arms of the waiting mob.

Bathed and tended in batches now that several were ready at once, Kain's remaining fledglings were property of the camp at large from their very first conscious moments. Zephon and Melchiah reacted to the attention with looks of confusion while the others were oblivious to the speculation all around them.

Kain almost missed Rahab's introduction into civilization entirely, the process of bathing his sedate lieutenant finished with so little fuss. Turning around from a burst of laughter at his second youngest's tumultuous episode in the tub, he spied the vampire's next-eldest sibling curled half in the lap of one of Vorador's prettier wives while another idly combed his hair. The fledgling appeared exhausted just from the press of people all around him, and was coping with it through the simple technique of closing his eyes and pretending it wasn't happening.

Turel on the other hand could only put up with so much of the well-meant groping before startling his caretakers with a wordless bark of dismay. He half-crawled, half-staggered to the relative safety of the wagons and huddled against a barrel with a surly expression for anyone who came too close. One of the guardsmen took pity on the fledgling, settling himself next to the vampire and shooing the women away when they sought to finish his grooming.

Melchiah was social by comparison, still relatively witless when judged against to how he would be in a matter of hours, the boy quickly adapted to the fussing and smiled readily when praised. Likewise Dumah was inclined to be tolerant of being dressed and inspected by a small mob curious women, although he was visibly less satisfied when cosseted by the men around him. Kain snorted at his infant inclinations.

Raziel simply watched. Keen eyed and alert to everything and anything around him, he reminded Kain of a young hawk in its mews. Ready to fly and hunt, even if he wasn't yet certain of what was predator and what was prey, he seemed intent on studying his world thoroughly before deciding how to interact with it.

In the end, the honor of speaking first went to Zephon, of all of his children.

"Ouch!" The anklebiter declared abruptly as he was groomed. Turning to look at the woman combing his hair in with a petulant expression, the vampire added. "That hurt." Before seeming to realize he'd done something remarkable in voicing the complaint and abruptly clamming up.

Blinking in surprise, the vampires pulled back and stared at the fledgling, before looking to Kain for guidance. He shrugged, seeing nothing abnormal in the boy's development. The former Saraphan were bound to begin verbalizing as their brains returned to some semblance of normalcy.

As if the feat accomplished by one was a sign to the others, they all began to talk. It was hardly grand poetry, but the fledglings were more than willing to apply words to things they knew, cheerfully encouraged by Janos and the others in their early successes. For those among the cabal who had never witenessed a resurrection other than of the mundane sort, the childish idiocy of the former Saraphan crusaders caused no end of amusement. Kain leaned back against a bale of supplies and shook his head, knowing the comical process of mental recovery wouldn't last much longer. Once they possessed their full wits, his children would undoubtedly be far less entertaining for the cabal at large. But they'd be useful, and that was all he intended for them.

Perhaps it was because he was silent that the others didn't notice Raziel slipping towards the edge of the firelight and away from the crowd. Kain caught the movement out of the corner of his eye and moved to follow surprised by the sudden initiative shown by the vampire. His first instinct was to check the fledgling before he strayed too far from the group, however when the chance came to catch the boy and turn him back towards the camp, he let it pass without action. Raziel moved like a ghost between the trees, unaware or uncaring of his presence a few paces behind. Wondering what it was that drew the former-knight forward, Kain gamely followed. The valley absorbed the happy commotion of camp a few meters into the trees, leaving them with the wind, and the sound of owls for company. Raziel seemed to pick his course at random, until finding a deer track, he followed that a while instead. Kain recognized their destination as being a little further upstream than he'd explored earlier, and moved to catch his child before they came to the water. Fortunately Raziel had other ideas than to cross the dangerous barrier. Content to stay well away from the water once free of the trees, he turned his gaze upwards instead, seemingly captivated by the clear view of the stars. Kain followed his look and could not deny that the sight was unusually fine.

The waxing crescent of the moon hung just over the mountain's peak behind him, it's brilliance limited to a sliver against the night sky. Without a cloud to obstruct them, or the moon to overwhelm their glow, the quantity of distant points of light seemed to multiply far beyond their norm, vast collections of them forming a band across the heavens. It was impossible to not feel small, when faced with such a clear view of infinity overhead. Kain's eyes immediately tracked towards the eastern horizon, picking out the distant threads of the Pillars, rising ever upwards towards eternity. Somewhere, impossibly high above, either they stopped half way to nowhere, their tops capped with finials somewhere above the clouds. Or they butted up directly against the sky like roof trusses where it hung like an inverted bowl over the surface of the earth. He wasn't sure which hypothesis he found more comforting. Either way, it was still a beautiful sight.

A touch against his arm drew his thoughts back to earth again. Kain noted his companion's stare with a small smile. Raziel had the audacity to look concerned at his distraction. He tilted his head to consider the vampire's thin features. "It's not safe for one such as you to walk alone. Even at night."

Raziel dipped his head apologetically, glancing at the trees around them as if to point out that they were entirely alone. Suddenly his silence was irritating. Kain couldn't quite explain to himself, exactly what it was about the fledgling's pantomime that grated on him, but never the less, the urge to shake the infant knight by the shoulders was there.

"Speak, child." Kain nudged the boy's shoulder. "You have a voice, and the wits to use it. Say something."

For a moment he was certain the vampire would refuse him. Pale yellow eyes gleamed in the darkness, appraising his demand with silent intensity. "Anything." He tried to encourage the boy without sounding any more foolish than he already did.

"Why?" Raziel spoke at last, voice rough for lack of use as the fledgling formed his first words. There was no malice in the question, only calm curiousity. "To what purpose?"

"So that I may hear you speak." Kain sighed, feeling older than ever to be having such an awkward conversation with a man he'd once known so well. The idea that it was all to be done over again was momentarily so fatiguing that he couldn't bear to consider it. And yet, it was Raziel beside him, and when seen in that light, the years they would repeat together would be over and done with far too soon. "I have waited to hear you voice for longer than you realize, child. Do not make me wait any longer."

"What would you have me say?"

"Tell me your name, at least. Do you know it?" He quashed the urge to ask for something more ridiculous. Infant the boy might be, but he wasn't a mindless parrot to be asked to recite phrases of no meaning to him just because they were something he wanted his previous Raziel to say. Forgiveness, or absolution, were things this Raziel couldn't grant him.

"Raziel." The boy frowned, seeming to really recognize himself for the first time. "I am… Raziel."

"That is correct."

"You are Kain." Raziel looked up at him, issuing the statement almost as if it was an accusation.

"I am that creature." He nodded. Raziel frowned again, giving the statement due consideration. Kain distracted him with a gesture encompassing their clearing and the meadow beyond. "This- this is Nosgoth."

"Is it yours?" The fledgling asked innocently.

"Not yet." Kain snorted in amusement. "But it will be."

"Why?"

"Because it is my right. And my duty." He reached out and ruffled the vampire's hair again entertained inspite of himself at the flurry of questions. The caress was rapidly becoming a habit. Kain scolded himself over his obvious fondness for the fledgling, hooking his claws into his belt loops to prevent himself from repeating the gesture. "Look your fill at your precious stars, child. I will grant you a few minutes longer before we must return to camp."

Nodding slowly, Raziel turned his face skyward again, soon lost to anything but the distant twinkle of above.

_8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8  
_

"Felicitations appear to be in order, Kain."

The words echoed softly despite the open air all around him. The rooftop was quiet, and the evening far too early for the vampiric residents of the manor to be awake. Other than the birds, and the wind through the trees, he ought to have felt very much alone. Kain resisted the urge to flinch, folding his arms in annoyance instead.

The impression of dank passages in the darkness, and the wet slithering of primordial limbs came to him with little warning. The sudden presence nearby soured an otherwise mild evening considerably, but he couldn't easily pinpoint its locus. He quashed his instinctive impulse to check over his shoulder, knowing that while his adversary adored startling him, it was extremely unlikely that the beast's latest puppet was within Vorador's sanctum. Vampires were, by in large, immune to the false god's mental manipulations; due, perhaps, to their particular status somewhere between life and death. The Hylden had done him a singular favor in that sense, in cursing his adoptive race.

Neither Hylden nor Vampire were susceptible it seemed. The demon-loving fools were too warped by their time in the abyss. And even if they weren't, their hatred of the 'wheel' was as much a part of them as their own limbs. The monster's mouth-piece would be human, or perhaps bestial, or maybe nothing physical at all, just a concentration of the burrowing fiend's energy. Kain considered first the manor's grounds, and then idly checked swamp around them with both eyes and occult senses.

The so-called 'god' was out there, somewhere. But then, in a sense, he always was. It was only the intensity of the sensation that had changed. He snorted to himself, reminded yet again of the ages old adage, that one couldn't see which tree was the tallest when standing in the middle of a forest. The Hub of the Wheel, the beast called itself, and indeed its reach was incredible. There was likely not a single corner of the earth that the uncanny creature had not burrowed into. With a body quite possibly spanning the continent, it was truly an omnipresent foe.

Still. It wasn't like old squid to heckle him without an avatar near by. Letting his eyes drift across the swampy scenery around Vorador's manor, Kain's gaze fell on a shadow that hadn't been there a moment before. Perhaps it was a man, or it once had been. The cloaked form wavered somewhat in the half-light of dusk, not exactly real, for all its chatter. No point hunting it, he sighed. The specter would just melt away beneath his claws.

"Or perhaps, I should offer my condolences." The ancient monster chuckled softly in amusement. "It's only a matter of time, after all."

"As a prophet you're less than impressive." Kain remarked dryly. "I thank you kindly for reminding me of what I am already well aware of. Will there be something else? Perhaps you wish to illuminate me as to the immanent onset of moonrise… or better yet, the solstice a week from now…"

"You mock me, Kain, yet it is yourself who is deluded." The Oracle of the ancients sighed patiently. "All of your hopes and dreams, pinned on an infant vampire too weak to face the light of day? A drop of water? A lick of flame? A lucky knife? I have barely to lift my hand…"

Kain hissed as the ground trembled slightly. Birds erupted from their sleepy perches in the trees around the valley, cackling and crying as they were startled awake by the shaking. The old manor shed small pieces of grit and plaster. Deep below, the Elder God was undoubtedly at work.

"I could, you know." The self-proclaimed god murmured slyly. "Your petty flock swallowed up all in an instant… drowned, crushed, buried… _forgotten_. And Raziel. Your sweet Raziel, upon whom you have gambled your life, dead among them. _Mine_. Again. Forever. What would you do then, I wonder?"

Pressing his lips together, Kain, ignored the leviathan's threat, as upsetting to his liver as it was. Batting words back and forth was just that. It was the possibility that the monster could act on his ambition that concerned him. He reached out with his will, both across the forest to the west, and down into the bedrock at the same time. The Pillars opened to him with their wealth of ageless wisdom, and confirmed what he already suspected. The land under Vorador's home was made of far sterner stuff than the swamp adjacent. The squid might shake all it wanted, it was unlikely the granite outcrop would ever budge. Omnipresent? Unfortunately. Omniscient? Quite possibly. Omnipotent? Seemingly not. Kain smiled to himself in quiet relief at not having to produce a miracle on little notice.

"You're bluffing." He stated what they both knew. "But don't let me stop you. It sounded very well, for an idle threat. My congratulations. Clearly you've been practicing."

"You persist in taking your situation lightly?" The deep voiced monster asked. "How long, Kain, do you truly think it will last? How long can you keep such an infant alive when there are legions actively seeking his death?"

"I managed well enough last time."

The Elder God snorted in cynical amusement. "I wasn't _trying_ last time, Kain."

"Does that mean I get to look forward to you trying now? What an amazing thing. Do let me know when you start… I'd feel churlish if I failed to notice."

The ground shook again with the subterranean beast's annoyance. Somewhere out in the deeper recesses of the swamp, a distant crash heralded the fall of a tree, probably a dead trunk upset from its tenuous existence by the recent quake. Still there were no further words from the beast. Seemingly tired of his conversation, the former Oracle of the vampires faded from his perception until it was indistinguishable from the low level aura he sensed everywhere. The beast had turned its attention elsewhere, it seemed.

Reviewing their dialog, Kain was fairly pleased with his reactions. It was hard to put a score on such minor feints as that, but in this case he felt confident that he had come out with the upper hand. Annoyed, but not discomposed, it wasn't he that had backed down in the end.

He locked his claws together behind his back and stretched mightily. Enjoying the return of the sleepy atmosphere to the swamp. Lanterns were being lit in the courtyards below, the distant murmurs of the young ones echoing the same questions over and over again. Had they felt the tremors? Had they ever felt an earthquake before? Were such things common? Was there any damage to the house? Kain listened with half an ear as he turned to consider the complex roofline of Vorador's sprawling home, seeing here and here where tiles had worked loose. Still the rambling manor seemed little harmed by the shake-up, some sweeping, and a few minor repairs, and no one need ever know.

/Kain?/ The mansion's owner whispered loudly from somewhere within. /Kain was that _your_ doing, you lunatic? Have some respect for other people's property! If you want to go play god and upset the local geography, do it _somewhere else_, you hear me?/

/I was not the quake's author, if that's what you're implying./ He rolled his eyes at the predictable squawking from his host. /But if I were you I'd get some of the lighter youngsters up and walking the roof before the next storm./

He couldn't help but antagonize the green furred vampire a little, entertained by his distant grumbling about the cost and nuisance of repairs. As far as he could see barely a windowpane was cracked by the property's recent ordeal. The old curmudgeon was unbearably house-proud at times.

Vorador would undoubtedly scold later, if the vampire learned he'd been baiting 'god' again. Kain sighed at his peculiar position in the world. Certainly he was the Scion of Balance, but it didn't seem to grant him any special immunity from heckling by his nearest and dearest. He might simply terrorize Vorador and Janos into submission, he supposed. Kain had little doubt that he could, if he wished, compel both of his supposed peers into roles little better than slaves. But what would be the point? He had no use for grovelers, and frequently enjoyed the idle spats with Vorador especially as a way of passing a dull year or two. The chance for some rational company down through the long ages was worth the occasional nagging, he supposed.

The Pillar of States hummed helpfully, reeling off a dizzying array of equations for him, a proud child seeking to impress its parent. Sparing a thought to consider what it wanted, Kain physically flinched at the volume of unwanted information. The Pillar's wealth of scientific lore showed how it might be possible to transmute mud to stone or stone to water, the heats and pressures required to reform stone and move it about as if it was mere butter in the churn. It was ready and willing should he give the command to reshape not just the manor's foundation, but the entire valley.

He pushed its overeager sendings aside with a grimace, not quite ready yet to cope with the fact that he might, in a very literal sense, bend the world to his will. As gratifying as it was to be able to play at godhood if he wished, he was more than willing to leave most of his powers in the realm of the theoretical. It wasn't comfortable to consider what he _could_ do, on a whim, too seriously. He'd spent too many years enthralled by his own megalomania already. Some things were left well enough alone. Still, the sense of abstract disappointment he got from the Pillar was almost pitiable. Kain shook his head at his own fondness for the semi-sentient edifice.

He hadn't much use for States, usually. Nature? Certainly. Time, Mind and Conflict, all of them he leaned on fairly regularly, for advice, for assistance, or simply to scold. But the others? Dimension, Energy and Death did their duties with little need for his interference, or intervention. If he had to describe their personas, the word 'content' seemed the most apt. Balance's presence was so interwoven with his own that he often didn't even truly _feel_ it the way he did the others. It was simply there, a part of him, a solid support to lean against when he was having an especially tiring decade. But States, was often petulant, eager. Its presence was rather like that of a hummingbird or other small, darting thing. It felt in accordance with its nature, he supposed. It _was_ the totem of 'change' after all. Neither a force for good nor ill specifically, it wasn't the sort of thing to sit about idle. He, its benevolent guardian, ought to steer its energy in some vaguely productive manner he supposed. But what?

Looking around the swamp, and the now fading presence of the false god, Kain had the beginnings of an idea. Reaching out again, he mentally tapped the Pillar to get its wandering attention. Turning mud to stone, he suspected, wasn't all that difficult, in the grand scheme of things. But how might a person go about turning a complex, and possibly inter-dimensional, creature spanning a thousand leagues… into something else? Water, mud, quartz crystal, swamp gas, pure gold, he wasn't picky. He just wanted it gone. The Pillar accepted the challenge with what he could only describe as a burst of joy. Its magics turned inwards in impossibly complex patterns as it considered the idea. Kain nudged it again, reminding the artifact that it was to _ask_ him before it actually did something.

The Pillar's preoccupied acknowledgment made him smile again. For some reason it reminded him of Melchiah during the Dark Empire. Often times he'd needed to shake his youngest general by the shoulder to get his attention when the vampire was fully involved with one of his 'projects'. Still, he had to wonder if maybe he'd unwittingly caused a problem by setting the Pillar to such an arbitrary task. Balance's steady unconcern left him comforted, however, and Kain was willing to wait, if the answer to his question needed a year or two to consider. He had plenty else to keep him occupied for the near future.

Kain made his way down the stairs from roof to corridor, from corridor to suite. Entering the wide hall where his newly restored little family took its rest, he observed the fledglings as they rose for the evening.

Some members of his inner circle more successful than others at making a start on their 'day'. Raziel and Rahab were already thick as thieves, pressed, dressed, and ready for their training as they stood to one side. The smaller of the two was pointing out something in a tomb he was holding to his brother, but they both paused to bend slightly in acknowledgment of his passing.

Melchiah fumbled a bow as he stood half-dressed. Zephon was lounging in bed, dressed but still idle as he offered cynical critique on his younger brother's ability to sleepily pull his boots on. He flipped a vague salute. Turel, caught between alternately seeing to his own preparations and attempting to get his younger brother from bed, gave him a silent look of resignation. Kain snorted and caught Dumah by the shoulder, quilts and all, in order to deftly roll his stubbornly sleeping carcass off his mattress and onto the floor. Turel dipped his chin with a small smile to thank him as he stepped over the now alert, if disoriented, fledgling on his way down the hall.

"You lot have twenty minutes before I expect you ready to present yourselves at the training grounds." He turned to remind them as he reached his door.

Five pairs of eyes met his with perfect comprehension. The sixth pair, blinked stupidly as Dumah still sought to catch up with the events that had led to his waking. Gesturing to Raziel, and then to his lagging brother, Kain sighed. "Assist Turel, in getting that one in order, would you?"

"At once my lord." Raziel bowed slightly as Rahab snapped his book shut with a look of annoyance as his nearest elder sibling.

Kain snorted in amusement at how even in 'childhood' their natures and preferences were already plain. Between them Raziel and Turel would manhandle their younger brother into his clothes and marshal him into tidying his space. The sooner the pair became accustomed to ruling over their potentially obstinate sibling, the better for them when they became generals. Taking his cue from his elder bothers Rahab would do much the same for the younger set, and everyone would be ready on time.

He left them to shift for themselves, shutting his door on their soft squabbling. There'd be precious little time to himself until dawn, with the crew of rowdy fledglings to keep in check, never mind dealing with the rest of the cabal. Unhooking the Reaver from his shoulder, he settled into his chair and propped his feet on the edge of his bed, stretching his legs as he sought a moment to settle his thoughts. The blade shimmered softly in the relative darkness of his private rooms. Its soul was sleeping, but still evident despite the long years since their last 'real' conversation. He ran his claws over the carved skull on the hilt. Habitually checking it for any sign of damage or unusual wear, glad to see none. Kain rested the blade across the arms of his chair, and folded his own atop its sinuous length, letting it carry his weight as he relaxed.

"Well, child…" He sighed. "It seems we must be vigilant this time around."

It was impossible to tell if the blade's fond hum of contentment was in response to his statement, or just a general reaction to his touch, and his thoughtful mood. He caressed it fondly, wishing, not for the first time, that it would remember him in its dreaming.

"You heard the delusional burrower's ranting, didn't you?" He continued, not caring if the Reaver wasn't really listening. "Your alter-ego seems to be in high demand this time. What do you make of our odds, hmm? Of keeping him in one piece long enough to be able to play this game with us when the time comes?"

The Reaver was warm beneath his arms, just as alive as the boy in the hallway, in its own occult way. Where the child could smile or frown or give voice to his thoughts, the blade was a blank. Still, there was something terribly soothing about its consistency. Kain rested his head against the back of his chair and closed his eyes, letting its steady presence lull him into a momentary oneness with the world.

The Elder God wouldn't make good his threat _tonight_, or any night in the near future. Kain knew it better than that. The creature would wait. Wait for him to forget, for him to let his guard down, wait for the moment when the assault would be especially poetic. Then it would strike. Ah, melodrama, he could almost hear his former Raziel sigh in cynical amusement. Really, the false-god was the least of his worries, for the moment. The very real possibility of the fledgling walking stupidly into a rainstorm due to a moment of absentminded foolishness was far more likely. First things first, he sighed. Get the young idiots trained up into something resembling a group of self-sufficient adults. Then he would worry about the rest.


	12. Chapter 12

**Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King**

AU/continuation- fic of 'Defiance'

I've decided to give the elder god italics (if they show up) just because he needed something to set him apart… also, I've started interleaving POVs between our heroes :-) Which will probably be the trend for the rest of the story… Section headers should hopefully give a clue as to the character in question.

**The Beginning – Chapter 3**

- - - - - - - - - -

**K A I N**

The game of harts-and-hounds was one familiar to any child of the region, villagers and noble-born both. It was no surprise therefore, that the childish amongst the vampire clan, and those whom considered themselves children at heart, indulged in the activity when weather and whimsy were in accord.

Vorador leaned against one of the pillars of his manicured front lawn, watching fledglings and soldiers both as the two groups ducked and dodged between the trees in a mock-hunt. Kain shook his head in dismay as Turel was dog-piled by no less than five of Vorador's scouts when he mistakenly turned a corner without due caution. The joke was soon on them however, because five vampires were not sufficient to hold the infant down. Struggling upright and carrying most of his supposed captors aloft with him, Turel laughed boldly as he peeled them off one by one and dropped them gently to the ground. Turning from his now-defeated foes, he laughed again, to see Melchiah carried back to the Manor slung across a vampiress' shoulder like a fresh-killed deer. Using the entertaining sight as a distraction, Melchiah's older brother escaped back the way he had come. The scouts neither noticed nor cared, too busy cheering their clanswoman as she strode to the gate. Melchiah waved at them as he was carried through their rank, happily indifferent to his circumstance.

Vorador chuckled as well at the sight, leaning forward to kiss the girl in congratulations as she smugly dropped her 'catch' at Kain's feet. Melchiah smiled up at him in weak greeting, not seemingly upset by his capture and casual abuse. "I fear I am not good at this game, sire."

"Apparently not." He reached down and easily hauled the boy to his feet, giving him a cursory brush on the shoulders to remove the leaves that he must have gathered in being run down amongst the trees. Seeing Vorador was well distracted in continuing his reward to his 'wife' he gestured that the fledgling might as well make good his escape in order to continue the game.

"Try harder to not be seen, next time." Kain advised as his youngest peered around circumspectly and then bolted in a likely direction. No sooner than the boy was past the safety of the lawns, he was tackled again, this time by the scouts Turel had recently thrown off. Kain had to smile at Melchiah's cry of dismay at being apprehended so speedily. His grin grew wider still at the sudden return of his formidable elder brother; Turel howling merry murder as he chased off the flock and made good a rescue. The pair soon lost themselves in the brush, leaving him to wonder at the state of the others.

No one had turned up with Raziel slung over their shoulder yet. Kain mused, pondering what tricks his cleverest offspring was concocting in order to stay ahead of the mob hunting him.

Taking a staircase up to the walkway along the outer wall of the manor's forecourt, he dispensed with dignity enough to climb an adjacent rooftop in order to get a better view on the antics of the evening. He'd offered up a small bounty of gold to which ever of his children was apprehended the least as a token-motivation for their efforts, and it seemed most of them, Melchiah excepted, were putting up a good defense, even with a sizeable group arrayed against them.

A crashing of underbrush heralded Dumah's emergence from the trees. Two vampires apiece squirmed as they hung from each of his arms, waiting to be dropped at the front gate as evidence of his prowess. In this case, clearly the hunted had turned the tables on the hunters.

Kain shook his head at the fledgling's inability to grasp the intent of the game. Dumah wasn't one for running and hiding, not when he could simply overpower anyone who tried to take him. There was no telling how far the thick-necked fledgling had carried the sore group of scouts. His strength and stamina were manifesting both early, and undeniably. He caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye and grinned at what he saw. A hunting party of women were creeping up on his boastful offspring with both bed sheets and ropes, ready to make good the adage that strength, without cunning, was good for little. Dumah's yelp was far from dignified as he was rapidly set upon and subdued. Undoubtedly Turel would need to play rescuer to this sibling as well before the night was through.

He'd lost count of how many of the clan were playing the game. Other than his lot of fools, a number of Vorador and Janos' younger children were using the warm evening as an excuse to stretch their legs while their elders patrolled the valley and watched on in amusement.

- - - - - - - -

**R A Z I E L**

The trick was to not be seen, Raziel concluded. He held his breath as he skirted silently around a cheerfully prowling vampires, minding his footing for anything that would give him away. Outnumbered as he and his brothers were, there was little choice but to use cunning, or simply run, when faced with the 'hunting parties' on the look out for them. Even running was problematic, given the limited nature of the territory, and the fact that the scouts were uncannily quick on their feet.

One particular tree-trunk seemed a likely-candidate for his next move, and he stepped back a little in order to get the necessary running start to scale his way to the lowest branch. From there it was a simple enough matter to scrabble aloft and get a better feel for the lay of the land around him. The game extended from the manor's grounds out to the bottom of the hill where the swamp began in earnest. There was the road of course, cutting a fairly dry route through the wetlands and up out of the valley to where the humans lived, but that was generally off limits to fledglings.

Raziel crouched on his heels as he considered how he would proceed. Another tree, equal in size to the one he currently inhabited, seemed the most likely prospect. Gathering himself, he leapt across the open space between the branches, catching himself against the trunk when his boots might have slipped.

What he wouldn't give for finger and toe claws of the sort the older vampires flaunted, Raziel sighed as he hauled himself higher up the trunk to a safer vantage point. Climbing would be trivial someday, but for now he was clumsy and slow by comparison to the soldiers and scouts he trained with. His hunters returned, backtracking through the clearing beneath him as they sought his lost trail. Holding his breath again, he waited for them to pass again before daring a second leap. The ancient trees possessed pathways and terrains all of their own, if one dared to navigate the high branches. He crouched and ran along one of the tangled mass of limbs, trusting his light weight to keep him from breaking any of the more fragile portions of timber.

It wasn't like someone could honestly 'win' the game they were all playing. The point was simply to catch, and be caught, over and over again until both sides tired of the sport and returned to the manor for the night. Undoubtedly someone was keeping count, whom was easiest prey, whom were more canny… And his lord had offered gold to whichever of them was hardest to catch, he reminded himself. Not that the gold mattered terribly, as they had, as yet, nowhere to spend it. But it was the principle of the thing. He eagerly anticipated the day when the older vampires permitted them to leave the grounds at will and go down into the nearest villages. Having read and studied at length about human civilization, he was eager to see it for himself.

Beyond the stated-reward, there was a certain pride to be maintained in not making it too easy for the scouts to run him to ground, he mused, sliding down a trunk several meters from where he'd begun and sprinting across a dry streambed. His younger brothers were undoubtedly keeping closer to the manor, and would inevitably get tangled, but he was willing to give Turel good odds on survival, and his own luck seemed to be holding fairly well. By staying along the base of the hill, he forced those seeking him to patrol the widest amount of ground, increasing his odds of staying beyond their reach. The lower portion of the estate was also susceptible to the creeping fogs that filled the swamp lands, further aiding him by reducing the general visibility. On top of it all, the trees were older, untamed, at the edge of Vorador's estate, giving even his novice hands and feet ample places to mount and scale the enormous obstacles. Raziel swung aloft again, leaping from stump to branch, and then pulling himself higher through the thickly clustered limbs until he was entirely shrouded by the damp mist. The scent of mud, peat, and primordial nature of the bogs nearby was heavy in the night air. He breathed deep, finding the atmosphere invigorating.

Being outdoors was far preferable to in, on such a fine night. The manor was comfortable, to be sure, but something in him craved the wilderness. Raziel breathed again, wondering at his own dichotomy. As much as he loved the trappings of civilization: his bed, meals with the clan, art, music, books, conversation, there were times when it was all just too… confining. The idea of getting out of the manor, out beyond what was ruled to be safe and assured, to really experience life and see the length and breadth of Nosgoth, was undeniably captivating.

Soon, Raziel counseled himself to be patient. Undoubtedly they would not be deemed children forever. Kain would lead them forth when he felt they were ready, able, to survive beyond the borders of their comfortable den. Still, if given the chance to test his limits, Raziel couldn't not help but to try, just a little. He peered to his right, out into the deeper mists of the swamp, and listened as he'd been taught. There was nothing in the customary sounds of nighttime to lead him to believe that the swamp was more perilous than usual. He had his hunting knife on, out of habit. And if he kept to the trees, he might take a little detour out and around the next group of scouts, with no one the wiser of the fact that he'd crossed out-of-bounds. The trees were aligned almost perfectly for the route he wanted to take. Raziel smirked to himself at the confusion he was causing to his unsuspecting hunters as he leapt between trunks, and worked his way west, noting in idle interest at the heavier scent of the swamp once he moved only a few yards into it.

From one branch to the next, he paid careful attention to his footing. In the heavier air of the valley proper, all manner of mosses and lichens grew on the tree bark, making the going slow and occasionally treacherous. Raziel eyed the watery looking terrain at the base of his current perch and resolved to make his next jump without slipping. He took a minute to rest and gather himself for the necessary sprint.

Strange how quickly the fog grew in the lowlands as well, he mused. He hadn't thought the air cold enough to sustain such strong mists lower in the valley. Hardly an expert on the bog and it's nature, he shrugged, and inspected his surroundings to ensure he was still on course. The hillside marking Vorador's lands was a dark shadow to his left, as it had been for the past several minutes. Its looming presence was a comfortable reminder that while he might have strayed past what was to be considered 'safe' at least he hadn't strayed far.

The peaceful quiet was so pervasive, the air so still, that he swore he could hear the soft wing beats of owls as they hunted their tiny prey. Raziel crept along his route but paused a moment before his jump as a whisper of a call came to him. At first the voice was nearly indistinguishable from the low thrum of the marshlands, but then even that seemed to grow silent, and the whisper became clearer.

"_Raziel…"_

He froze at the sound of his name. The whispering voice was like nothing he'd ever heard before, not vampire, nor human, but something more. The need to hear it again, to discover whom was calling him drew him forward even as his spine tingled with the vague sensation of danger. Voices in the mist were not to be trusted, his instincts told him, but still... Raziel hesitated a moment. The next branch, and his route back to the hill were directly infront of him, but only a little out of reach was a different path, one that would take him just a little further, allow him to explore for a minute more, the strangeness that beckoned to him.

"_Raziel."_

More than a whisper, and certainly not an idle fancy, the voice named him again, seemingly certain that it had his attention. The sound of its soft satisfaction, more than anything, decided his course. Raziel navigated towards a tree standing on a likely looking hummock of earth, needing to get lower to satisfy his curiosity. "Who is there…" He forgot for a minute that his whisper would not likely carry in the thick air. Drawing breath, he tried again. "Who is it who calls to me?"

"_Raziel."_ His unseen solicitor hailed him a third time, seeming to have not heard his question. This time however the whisper didn't fade to silence but instead continued its recitation. Soft though the words might be, they seemed to echo in the darkness. Resonant and deep, he could feel the call in the marrow of his bones. _"Bloodborn. Vampire. Son of Balance."_

"I suppose I am all these things." Raziel agreed, climbing down carefully until he could get both feet back on firm ground, checking the long grasses carefully lest he put down a foot into some undiscovered bit of bog-land. "But who are you?"

For all that the unfamiliar speaker sounded closer than before, there was no trace of any life in the wilderness other than his own. Looking around in the marshy darkness, Raziel wondered at how even the animals of the valley had grown unusually quiet. He stared over his shoulder at where Vorador's hillside was all but hidden from view, marking the direction should flight prove the best course of action.

His neck prickled but there was no immanent threat that he could see. Besides, the vampire lord's scouts patrolled the entirety of the woods and bogs on a regular basis, he told himself. Nothing puissant to a vampire would be left un-remarked-upon so close to where the cabal took their rest. He'd heard on more than one occasion the elder members of the household remark on how rare it was, in recent years, to find a good bit of sport amongst the trees. Even the monstrous inhabitants of the swamp seemed to have learned to fear the growing numbers of vampires that now walked amongst them.

Chafing his arms to dispel some of the chill of the fog, Raziel picked his way across a dry tongue of land and onto another little island. A bit of broken pillar provided a silent testament that Vorador's mansion was once not the only building the forest could boast of. Half-shrouded in mist one island further in, stood a broken piece of wall. A fragment of staircase still apparent, leading upwards, going nowhere.

"Hello?" He asked, more confused than ever that anyone should be out in the middle of the uninhabitable valley. "Where are you?"

"_Raziel. Red Prince.__**" **_ The voice's tone lightened, almost teasing, as it named him further, each grander than the previous. _"The Prodigal. Day-walker. Knight of the Empire. Hylden's Bane. Firelord. Defender of Nosgoth. Scion's Champion... I call to you. Come to me."_

Which each title given, Raziel felt more and more at a loss. Some were strange, some were improbable, some defied explanation, but the voice named him with such assurance that he found himself nodding in agreement despite himself. "I do not understand." He jumped a pool of fetid water, and climbed the few stone stairs in order to get a better view of what lay beyond. "I am but a mere fledgling. Do you seek to flatter me? If so, you've chosen an uncommonly strange method."

"_Do you know who I am, Son of Kain?"_

"Indeed I do not." He acknowledged. "Pray enlighten me?"

The mist cleared briefly, allowing him to realize that what he'd thought was a glimpse of moonlight was actually witch-fire, will-o-the-wisp, gathered in a dancing green flame above the crumbled remains of a building all but grown over by trees. Raziel blinked, recognizing the familiar figure-eight emblem still visible on the weathered blocks of masonry. It was the crest of the former Guardian of Time, Moebius, he remembered from his lessons. But what was it doing out here in the heart of vampiric dominion? The voice was stronger in that direction, the spectral fire seeming to shiver with every resonant word spoken.

"_I am your future." _ The words seemed to come from everywhere, from the distance, from beneath his feet. _"I am _all_ futures."_

Raziel pushed down his growing anxiety, studying his surroundings with sudden resolve to retreat. But which way had he come? Looking back where he thought he had crossed, he found the swamp changed, the span of watery mud between him and the next island several meters wide, further than he could comfortably jump. The ground trembled slightly beneath him and crouching on his perch, he hissed warily at his sudden predicament.

While the air between him and the ancient ruins was clear, the rest was hidden in the fog. Magic, he told himself, almost certainly. There was some sort of subtle wizardry at work.

Given the choice between reasoning with his unseen petitioner, and loosing himself in the fog, he decided on the former. Maybe his mysterious oracle would release him once it had spoken its peace. "You're a prophet, then?" He asked.

In the lingering pause before the voice answered him, he got the distinct impression that it was waiting for him to draw closer, to abandon his bit of wall in favor of exploring the larger ruins ahead. Raziel sat on his heels, determined to not take another step further from the safety of his home. There was something uncanny about his situation and it seemed foolish to advance further into what could be a trap.

"_I am your friend, young vampire."_Somehow, the statement didn't do anything to settle his stomach, the rich blood of his most recent meal souring with his nervous mood.

"_As such, I would give you friendly warning… If you would heed my council?"_

The voice continued. The impression that it was beneath him, beneath _the swamp_ refused to be dismissed even when logic declared it to be impossible. Raziel looked around for a likely tree to climb, suddenly certain he did not feel comfortable on the ground. There was only one within reach, and even that, only barely. He bit his lip and judged the distance carefully. It would be unpleasant if he missed. The space beneath the outstretched tree-branches was open water.

Raziel cleared his throat to keep from sounding too unnerved. "I would gladly accept any kindly advice, Sir Oracle. I thank you for thinking of me."

"_Your master may name me a liar, child. But it is he who will beguile and misuse you. Not I."_ The bodiless voice sighed as if in patient tolerance of the world's frustrations**. **_"Love him, if you must. For that is your nature. But do not trust him should he ever say he cares for you in return. For he knows, as I do, that serving him will lead to your certain doom."_

"What?" Raziel blinked at the unexpected statement. "I appreciate that I am full young yet, but surely you do not imagine me so naive that I would accept such a slander against the one who gave me life without questioning it?"

"_I imagine nothing."_ The voice replied, seeming unconcerned. _"I _know_ the truth. Someday, you will know it as well, Raziel-twice-born, but by then… it will be too late…"_

"Why, 'too late'?" He frowned. "What is this doom that is to befall me?" But the voice said nothing. Instead the air seemed unlocked from its earlier stasis, the fog around him pushed into uncanny whorls and twists with the suddenly gusting breeze. "Speak to me!"

Raziel stood up on his fragment of wall, searching for the witch-fire, and the ruins that had until a moment ago seemed mere paces away. The swamp was dark around him, but no longer silent, a host of unidentifiable rustles and soft splashes hinting at life returned to the wilds.

"Hello?" He sighed in exasperation. "Are you still there?"

Silence was his only answer. A gleam of faint light in the mist gave him brief hope that his unseen companion was still at hand. Raziel squinted to get a better view. Then the fog cleared with an errant breeze, revealing not the will-o-the-wisp fire of before, but the luminous eyes of a translucent monster the likes of which he'd never seen before.

As tall on its six segmented legs as an average man standing upright, its body was armored above and below by two wide plates of bone. The beast's mouth was shrouded in jaws akin to some giant beetle. Its front legs terminated in crab-like clamps, easily of a size to catch him by the waist, perhaps to snap him in half.

Raziel didn't wait to see whether its presence was friendly or not. He leapt, trusting instinct and luck to get him to the tree branches he'd been eyeing earlier. Luck was with him. His fingers closed over the rough bark and gave him the grip he needed to hang on, even with the limb swaying deeply in response to the sudden addition of his weight.

Raziel grimaced as he felt his dangling boot-tips graze the water of the swamp's surface and pulled himself up in order to hook a leg over the flexing bit of timber. The monster had found its way to his perch as he'd fled, proving it was agile over both land and water. It silently chattered its jaws at him as it watched him try and crawl hand over hand to a safer distance, one claw swaying, outstretched in the air, as if tracking the branch's erratic movements. For all that the creature seemed insubstantial, he could feel its presence along his skin. The fine hairs at the back of his neck standing up in response to its uncanny aura.

At length Raziel got his weight onto a heavier limb and climbed upwards several feet for good measure, putting as much distance as possible between himself and the thing that was hunting him. Suddenly the idea of capture by the scouts of the cabal seemed a fine and happy thing. He exhaled and cursed himself at how real his 'game' had suddenly become. He should have never left the grounds. Easily wading through the shallow swamp, the monster below suddenly lunged a ways up his tree's trunk, proving that its reach was considerable. Raziel climbed a level further up the tree, and seeing a chance to switch to an adjacent canopy, gathered and jumped. For a moment it felt as though his tactic would work. Staying out of reach of the beast would be a simple thing in the densely tangled branches of the trees, and the hillside was not so far away. He was fairly confident he knew his way home even with the mists making a mystery of everything more than a few meters ahead.

A whispery screech was all the warning he received that his earth-bound hunter was not alone. Something was in the trees with him. Raziel ducked, instincts yet again saving his life as claws cut through the air above his head with whistling speed only to embed in the wood behind him. At first he could make nothing of his new foe, the impression of semi-transparent robes, or scales, or perhaps even fins, struck him as he dove out of the way of another hook-shaped appendage angling to pierce his chest. He caught the next branch, but not well enough. Instead of scrambling into the adjacent tree's crown, Raziel found himself swinging downwards, almost falling as he fought to keep his grip.

At least he'd crossed the worst of the marsh. He realized as he landed on a sodden hillock with a curse. His boots held against the moisture, but he dared not stop and check. The sloshing sound of many legs moving quickly through the bog let him know his first enemy was not far behind. The high pitched shriek of the second sounded frustrated, hungry, in the air behind him. Choosing a course at random from the drier terrain available, Raziel _ran_.

- - - - - - - -

Raziel panted as he fought his way amongst the often-false footing of the swampy islands he sought to lose himself between. Somehow he was staying ahead of the fiends tracking him, but never by more than a few breaths. With the familiar slope of the hillside still nowhere to be seen, he was beginning to truly wonder whether his false step off of Vorador's hallowed grounds might prove fatal after all. The so-called oracle must have tricked him far deeper into the swamp than he'd imagined. Spying a drier looking patch of land, and some likely looking trees, he picked up his pace again, feeling almost optimistic.

The feeling faded abruptly when he collided with something unseen at chest height. The impact forced the wind out of him, and caused him to all but fall backwards in surprise. Raziel gasped, further surprised when he _didn't_ fall. Caught by his leather vest, he half dangled as he struggled to regain his footing, looking down at his stinging chest to realize that he'd hit not a branch, but rather someone's outstretched hand. He barely had time to digest the fact before he was hauled sideways, rammed up against a tree trunk with teeth-rattling force.

"_You_ are out-of-bounds, little one."

Raziel hissed as he gathered his shaken wits and rubbed the back of his head where it had impacted painfully against the bark. Still, part of him was more than happy with the scold. For with the promise of punishment for his stupidity, came the assurance that he was amongst his own kind again. Looking up, Raziel sought to thank his unhappy savior, and was stunned for what felt like the third time in so many seconds. Barely a breath away from his face lay two of the most undeniably beautiful breasts he'd ever seen in his short life. Their generous curve filled the vampiress' close fitting leather armor almost to the point of overflowing, and their scent, the subtle and sensual odor of the woman pining him, came to him without his truly intending to be crude enough to deliberately seek it.

Tearing his eyes away from the unexpectedly pleasant view before him, he looked up, and felt a measure of his interest fade beneath a far more rational and reasonable response to the woman in question.

It was Captain Umah.

He smiled weakly at her elegantly raised eyebrow. Undoubtedly she'd noted his momentary distraction and would add it to her tally when time came to mete out sentence for his night's transgression. "My lady…" He tried to gather himself for some sort of explanation, or perhaps an apology, when he suddenly remembered why he'd been running in the first place.

"Lady Umah, we are in danger!" He found his feet and dared to shake off her grip, looking back the way he had come with the expectation of finding the monsters charging up the watercourse. Raziel froze in surprise to see that there was nothing of the sort. The swamp looked… positively mundane. Umah tiched softly, coming up to stand behind him. Even listening intently, he could hear nothing; no screech, no clicking, no scuttling of crab-legs through the muddy water. Raziel exhaled in disbelief. They were gone.

Turning back to Vorador's fiercest wife, he could only shrug under her candid gaze. "I swear to you. There were two. One with an armored body, like a crab… one that could float in the air like a ghost… They chased me for nearly a kilometer…"

"Shadows. Raziel." She gave him a wry smile. "Nothing more. You've spooked yourself, is all. You know better than to be out here. There are still plenty of beasts that make their home here, willing to make a snack of a roving fledgling stupid enough to walk into their territory."

"I swear it. They were no fantasy." He shook his head, suddenly wondering even to himself, what in the past hour's events was reality and what was dream. It was all just too strange when told to another person. "There was a voice also. A voice like that of the earth itself. It called to me, from the heart of the swamp… It said… such things…"

"A voice?" Umah caught him by the chin, turning him to study his face closer, suddenly interested in his misadventure. "What kind of voice? What did it say?"

"It… knew my name." Raziel took a shaky breath, feeling more certain by the moment, that it _had_ been some sort of strange fantasy he'd been living, brought on by the fetid air of the swamp, no doubt. Umah was real, strong, solid, and very much alive before him, it seemed impossible that she and the phantom creatures that had been chasing him, could both exist in the same reality.

"It felt so real, lady." He exhaled again, looking over his shoulder in confusion. "I thought I'd be killed for certain."

Umah let go of his face to ruffle his hair lightly, the affectionate gesture not entirely in keeping with her usually aloof demeanor. He smoothed his locks down when she was finished, watching a she pushed passed him to make her own inspection of the wetlands. Armed for hunting, she had both bow and swords slung across her back. She'd been scouting, he realized, rather than playing at the game with her younger sisters. In blatantly crossing the borderline of the swamp he'd crossed over from his mock-combat into her very-real domain of kill-or-be-killed. He rubbed his neck, feeling if possible, even more the child compared to her. Umah studied the swamp for a long moment, using eyes, ears, and probably occult senses as well. At length she shrugged as well, turning back to him with a small smile. "Well. It seems whatever it was you encountered has hidden itself away again. You are unharmed?"

Ducking before she could rearrange his hair again Raziel took a moment to dust off some of the debris he'd collected in his sprint through the underbrush. Muddy, and winded, he could feel the bruises forming, but otherwise he felt unscathed. He shrugged at her question, not sure what to say that wouldn't make him sound like a fool a second time. Umah snorted and tossed her long tail of hair over her shoulder at his expression, seemingly in agreement. Reaching out she cuffed the side of his skull, but gently, in a Kain-like reprimand. "Come. Let us return to the gardens. I think you've had enough excitement for one night, fledgling."

"Yes, my lady."

"You may call me Umah, you realize." She snorted again, cupping the back of his neck with a no-nonsense grip as she steered him to walk ahead of her back along a narrow path. The vampiress was far older than him but not so old yet that she had three fingers instead of five. Her nails, while long and quite sharp, were not yet the claws of her sire. She still wore boots to protect her feet. Regardless of her relative youth, he felt far safer in the swamp with her at his side than he felt was prudent to admit. The female vampire was seasoned and deadly soldier. It was hard to imagine there being anything in the swamp that she couldn't face. Still, his nerves prickled in silent alarm, unable to relax after his surreal encounter. Truly, telling himself it was a fantasy was the only way to make any sense of it at all.

In due turn their path led to the main road, and upwards towards the manor. So close he might have tripped over it, he shook his head at how utterly lost he'd felt mere moments before.

Raziel smiled while she could not see it, finding the beautiful woman's grumbling to be not at all dissimilar to his own lord's chiding reminders about unnecessary obeisance. In that sense the two vampires were rather alike, he supposed, although in every other way, he found it hard to compare them. Kain was Kain. Umah? He couldn't help but fidget a bit under her touch, unable to stop himself. It was no wonder that she was Vorador's favorite. He sighed in dismay at having been caught in such a childish error by her in particular. As far as he could tell she was favored by every man in the Cabal not blind or mentally-crippled. It was no wonder, with so much to admire about her. Rumor had it that her charms were evident to mortals as well. That she never had to run down her prey if she didn't wish to, but rather could lure a man to her with the barest of glances, and have him under her thrall with a touch.

As tempting as her form might be, the personality that came with it left something rather wanting, he supposed, distracting himself from potentially risky appreciation of the woman in question. The hand on his neck could just as easily caress or kill, and the later was far more likely, especially when one of her waspish moods took her. He minded his footing and made an effort to cause her no further trouble. She was not one of the more lenient of Vorador's wives, nor was she known for her gentle temper. It was best to err on the side of over-politeness than risk a more serious cuff from the scout captain and warlady. Seeing how she expected an answer from him, he shrugged again.

"I would not dare to, my Lady Umah." He found his mood brightening as the slope rose with the road, taking them onto the familiar hillside of the Cabal's home ground. "I am your captive, for the moment, am I not? It would be unseemly if I were to be overly familiar…"

"Do you flirt on purpose, Raziel? Or is your silver tongue a unconscious skill." Umah wondered aloud, squeezing his neck in playful malevolence. "Sometime I think you have a little _too_ much of your sire in you. You are far too young yet to always have a prettily constructed speech ready at hand."

"I beg your pardon, if I have offended." He glanced over his shoulder at her, unable to help but smile again at the sight of her candidly unglamorous expression of defeat. She relinquished her grip on his neck a moment to cuff him again upside the head, then mussed his hair a second time for good measure.

"Little idiot. No more trouble now. You wouldn't like it above half, I wager, if I were to tell Kain precisely _where_ I caught you… now would you…" She remarked archly as he grumbled and tried to both walk and tidy himself. With her fingernails pressing against his neck once again in unspoken threat to match her verbal one, he didn't really have all that much of a choice. At least she wouldn't tell Kain of his illicit wanderings, he consoled himself, at least, not unless provoked. Putting the strangeness, and the voice from the ruins behind him, he concentrated on his footing as they returned to the manor.

- - - - - - - - -

**K A I N**

The game ended with the sinking of the moon and the first hints of false-dawn. Scouts and fledglings staggering back in, both together and alone, as their stamina waned. Turel and Dumah returned as a pair, shoulder-to-shoulder and chatting amicably as if their evening had been spent fishing or in some other idle pursuit rather than roughhousing from dusk to dawn. Somewhere earlier in the evening Turel had rescued his younger brother and the pair had successfully held off all comers after that. Zephon emerged with a group of scouts, tolerating their kindly teasing with his usual sardonic smile. Towards the end of the tail of stragglers, an unlikely pair emerged. Raziel and Umah, of all people, she guiding his eldest with a firm hand on his neck as she strode back to camp. Captured at last, he wagered from the boy's rueful expression and generally disheveled state. It was inevitable when faced with such an opponent. Undoubtedly his child had overcome all lesser foes handily.

Waiting for the final arrivals to materialize, he watched his family gather to one side and the scouts and householders assemble in audience on the other. Taking a minute to examine his infant brood under the torchlight, he decided they'd had a good bit of fun, and hopefully a bit of practice in stalking as well. Such games were useful for the young. For if they could master the art of evading each other, human hunters would be a trivial matter. Overhead the clap of large wings in the night air heralded that Janos had left his post as 'guard' of the back garden gates, and was coming to see the final tally. The blue skinned ancient landed lightly at the edge of the crowd and smiled happily when several of the more attentive of the young ones immediately gathered around him to solicit praise or share stories of their adventures.

Kain shook his head at the apparent joy the flock of youthful demands for attention could inspire in the sage. Janos was never without some sort of small mob around him, most days. The old one seemed to appreciate the company, although how he could stand to have the idiots constantly underfoot was a marvel. Better this than the alternative, his cynical side pointed out grimly. For a man who'd likely spent centuries involuntarily alone, thanks to the Saraphan purges, the chance to be surrounded by an ever growing family of happily unmolested fledgings was probably a pleasant thing.

Strange that he'd survived a similar span of time in virtual solitude, and yet found no echo of Janos' joy within his own chest. He rubbed his chin and mentally scolded himself for being an uncaring bastard. Then again, Kain mused, his isolation could in a sense be considered entirely voluntary. There'd been no particular reason to force the Imperial Court to disband after Raziel's death in the maelstrom. He'd just stopped caring.

He cared _now_, to an extent. He'd rather have the vampires of the cabal happy than unhappy, or dead. But he lacked the urge to be cosseted the way that Vorador and Janos seemed to enjoy. Other than the occasional verbal war with the old green bastard, or his new found habit of watching Raziel when the boy was about his business, he could be just as content alone as with the rest of the clan.

Chiding himself to stop woolgathering while the night wasted away, he clapped his hands to get the assembly's attention. The sudden sound did the trick, all eyes drawn to him in anticipation.

"How many of you caught Melchiah?" Kain asked drolly when the crowd quieted, tisking lightly at the number of raised hands amongst the flock. Nearly everyone had gotten a hand on his youngest at some point, from the look of it. The child in question grinned sheepishly, cuffed in playful punishment on both sides by Raziel and Turel for his haplessness in stealth combat. "And of course, Lady Umah," He smiled slightly at the smirking vampires. "You had the honor of recalling my eldest."

Although until her arrival he hadn't been aware she was playing the game, the woman had managed what her sisters and other scouts had not in bringing Raziel in at last. Glancing sideways at his lieutenant he noted Raziel flushed slightly as he recognized his defeat and bowed to Vorador's wife. The current rendition of his child might be of a quiet nature, but he was no eunuch. Undoubtedly the experience of being hunted and caught by the amazon had left an impression on him.

That would be an interesting pairing to watch for in future, Kain smiled wider at Raziel's worried look in his direction. Shaking his head to let the boy know that he wasn't in trouble for his failure to evade capture, he schooled his expression into his usual bland indifference as he considered Vorador's wife again. Something in her speculative way of watching Raziel told him all he needed to know.

They'd never suit in a serious relationship, he reasoned, knowing what he did of her nature, and of his child's, but that didn't mean there wouldn't be an affair at some point in the centuries to come. Which of the two would gain the upper hand over the other was something he was somewhat curious to discover. He'd have to wait and see.

"Now." He cleared his throat. "How many for Zephon?" Startlingly few raised their hands, a compliment to his second youngest's wily tricks, no doubt. He caught the slim fledgling's eye and smiled to show his favor at the boy's budding skills. No surprises there. It seemed, Zephon was developing exactly as expected.

"And how many for Turel?" Seeing the number of hands, and hearing Turel's disbelieving snort, he had to qualify his question. "How many of you actually were able to subdue him upon capture?" The number of claimants dropped dramatically, he chuckled at the boy's prowess. "Very good, Turel. And You, Dumah? No need to answer I suppose. I see you've come untied at last…"

Dumah sighed in annoyance at the reminder of his undignified capture and glared at the group of still giggling women now clustered behind Umah. Undoubtedly he'd be sore for a day or two. Kain sighed at the openly inviting way several of the women were smiling at the youth. What the boy lacked in intelligence and personality, he made up in pure animal charisma. Not all of Vorador's wives fancied lovers with refined manners and polite conversation, and those that enjoyed the ox-necked, chiseled-chin type had found their advances welcomed readily enough. They'd find a way to sweeten the idiot's mood before the week was out. Dumah, at least, would need no encouragement in order to further that aspect of his education.

Kain sighed, his eyes settling on his children again. Counting heads, he frowned to realize he was off by one. There was a gap in their number. The quietest of their rank was not merely discreetly standing towards the back, but rather outright missing. "And where is Rahab?"

He looked to Raziel for his answer, not entirely sure why. It was usually the case that his eldest kept nominal tabs on his siblings, but seeing his child's sudden confusion and dismay, mirroring his own, he pursed his lips. Turning to the crowd of suddenly worried scouts and soldiers he asked the question to the group at large. "Who among you captured my child, Rahab?"

When no hands went up, he frowned. "Who among you _saw_ him tonight?"

"He started the game with us, sire." Raziel spoke up, searching the shadows around them as if expecting his brother to materialize. "But I lost track of him in the initial chaos."

"I saw no trace of him in the trees." Umah offered thoughtfully, giving the woods at the edge of Vorador's lawn a quick inspection. "Nor did I smell him."

Kain raised his eyebrow at her offhand remark, wondering what she meant by that. Rahab was hardly the most active of his children, and his personal grooming tended to be excellent.

"Book dust." She explained succinctly, favoring him with an answer to his unspoken question. "He and my-lord-husband both have a penchant for smelling of their favorite hobby."

"I see." He had to smile at her keenly honed senses. "Still… He must be somewhere. Perhaps he has become inconvenienced in some manner…"

"We'll run the grounds." Umah agreed in a business like tone, nodding to her sisters to break into groups.

Vorador, having wandered over to join their discussion also nodded, looking to the walls of his manor thoughtfully. "He didn't get past me and slip back in through the front. And Janos was guarding the back gate…. So the boy didn't get by there…"

The vampire sage nodded in agreement with his lordly offspring, fanning his wings with his concern for the absent fledgling. "I saw him not at all, but it seems to me that he is close by… I shall check the ground from above, while the children search on foot…"

"Before any of you sprint anywhere in search of me…" A new voice claimed politely from the shadows overhead. "Perhaps you might consider the fact that I am not at all lost."

Kain settled his hands on his hips and watched as a slim figure suddenly detached itself from the top of the nearest of the decorative columns that lined Vorador's courtyard, and carefully shifted itself over the edge. Climbing with only a few scuffles and wrong-handholds down the carved stone pillar, his missing child dropped to earth at last, dusting off and presenting himself with a small smile of victory.

"I do not have my eldest brother's luck, sire. Nor do I possess Turel or Dumah's strength. Zephon, I have no doubt, is far slipperier than I. And Melchiah? Well, it is only a game to him, equally fun regardless of his own outcome. As I had no interest in being tackled, or tied… It seemed to me, my lord, the best way to win… was not to play."

"You were up there the whole time?" He asked, torn between amusement and resignation at the youth's dry appraisal of his chances. "It's a wonder you didn't grow bored."

Rahab silently produced a small book from his pocket, shrugging at his brothers' uniform groans of disbelief and dismay. "The moon was especially brilliant this evening, I found." He remarked with a mildness to equal Kain's own.

Kain plucked the soft-bound novel from the boy's hand and lightly smacked him on the head with it. His child took his punishment with his usual grace, bowing and accepting the book back before taking his place with his siblings. They gave him a few shoves and scolds of their own for good measure, but Kain could only shrug again, seeing that the boy's plan was not without merit. As the night was waning fast, there was no particular reason to delay in dispensing his modest award and providing some closure to the contest.

"Rahab, it seems, is the only prey to escape this evening un-captured. Although I do not personally agree with his tactic, it was singularly successful." He smiled as he tossed a small pouch to the fledgling in question, not above making the 'win' uncomfortable for his shy and retiring middle-born child. "He gets the prize of five gold marks, as promised."

His other children groaned again, frustrated by Rahab's un-victory. Kain grinned wider. "Assuming of course, that he can keep hold of them until morning?"

Seeing the speculative look dawn in Turel and Raziel's eyes, and Rahab's suddenly hunted expression, made the evening worth all the bother of humoring the children's sport. He gave Rahab an arch look. "If I were you, child, I'd start running."

Vorador laughed out loud next to him as Rahab took off, fleet footed despite his bookish demeanor. His brothers hesitated a minute and then broke to give chase as a group, Raziel pointing silently for his next-eldest brothers to flank him through the side doorways even as he dove through the front entrance after his escaping sibling. Umah found her way to her sire's side, leaning against the nobleman and accepting his fond arm around her waist as she too chuckled at the sound fledgling antics within the house. "That was cruelly done, Balance Guardian." She scolded lightly.

"Not at all." He disagreed with a smirk, appraising the hour with a glance at the sky before strolling back into the house. "Boy can use the exercise…"

- - - - - - - - - -

**R A Z I E L**

The stars were lovely in their winter brilliance. With coats and cloaks enough that the air didn't bite too sharply, he and his brothers had piled out onto the roof of the manor after their arms training was complete for the evening; determined to spend a little time in idleness before being recalled to the warm but tedious duties that awaited them indoors. Raziel settled on the steeply pitched slate roof of the main annex, careful that his cape stayed between him and the frosty shingles as he gingerly lay back and allowed himself to relax. Turel made a face as he settled beside him, standing a moment to tuck a second layer of his cloak between him and the icy surface beneath him before stretching his long legs out and folding his hands behind his head. Dumah settled with pacing the walkway nearby, still clearly energized by their sparring session with the older fighters. Raziel grimaced at his brother's limitless stamina, feeling his bruises from where the bigger fledgling had landed a hit or two on him. Dumah wasn't clever, but he _was_ strong.

"Want to trip him?" Turel asked cheerfully under his breath, noting his annoyed expression. "With the ice on the pavers, he'd probably slide on his ass all the way down to the garden, if caught at the right moment."

Raziel suppressed a grin, giving his supposedly 'younger' brother a merry look. The age difference between them, he had been told by Vorador and Janos, was a matter of mere minutes, but somehow the order of their precedence was as strict as if they were years apart. Of all of his siblings however Turel was perhaps the most equal to him in many ways. It often felt a little contrived to him, to apply the junior title to the vampire. "He'll howl blue-murder when he lands… and probably chase us all over the damned mansion in order to get his revenge…"

"Eh. Too much effort." The large framed fledgling beside him agreed, letting his head fall back onto his hands as he too considered the stars. Rahab emerged from the tower door a minute later, sheperding the last two of their company with an indifferent ear towards Zephon's grousing. The slender vampire made no pretense of enjoying the cold air, but rather made a bee-line for the space between Raziel and Turel on the roof, wedging himself between their outstretched legs in an attempt to leech some of their warmth, or at least gain the benefit of their cloaks on top of his own. Turel kicked the pushy vampire with an idle boot, ignoring his hiss of complaint. Turning to Raziel he sighed, "Wretch has a point, you know. It's fucking freezing up here. Remind me again why we're braving frostbite?"

Gesturing up at the stars, Raziel ignored the grumble he received in answer and grinned at Rahab as the lean-faced fledgling settled on his other side. Rolling his shoulders in evident soreness from his own stint in on the training grounds, Zephon's elder brother favored him with a tired look of resignation. For all that the vampire grumbled that hand-to-hand was a stupid way to fight, he had acquitted himself well. Even Melchiah had received praised from their teachers tonight.

Glancing back to his other brother, Raziel noted that Turel favored staring at the insides of his eyelids more than the heavens, and tisked softly at his lack of interest in the grand vista overhead. Rahab gave the stars a cursory inspection and then turned his attention to their other brothers whistling sharply to get Melchiah's attention when he deemed the fledgling's curiosity regarding the icicles forming along the edge of the roof's edge would lead to inevitable danger.

The youngest of their group, and truly, Raziel couldn't help but think of Melchiah as 'young' despite their negligible difference in actual age, grimaced and backed away from the edge of the roof at the unspoken chide. Digging in his cape's deep pocket's instead, he drew forth an odd assembly of wadded paper, wire and string.

"Anyone want to see a neat trick?" He held his handful up proudly.

Raziel propped himself up on his elbows and gave his brother a chagrined look, exhausted from a day of only intermittent sleep and a half night's efforts with the sword, he marveled at Melchiah's seemingly infinite supply of energy when it came to building and testing his odd little toys. Turel groaned beside him, having less patience with the strange fascination that their sibling had with all manner of mechanical problems. Zephon, likewise, snorted in tired disinterest, uncaring of his brother's crestfallen expression.

It was that, more than anything that made Raziel sigh in defeat and gesture that Melchiah might as well attempt to astound them with his latest disaster in the making. Sometimes the fledgling's experiments worked, and were genuine marvels. Mostly so far, they tended to be a trifle overcomplicated, and often, somewhat dangerous. Rahab pursed his lips, but likewise nodded that Melchiah might as well continue.

With an audience of two willing to observe his latest achievement, their sibling grinned merrily and set about assembling his home-made device. Raziel looked to his bookish brother with a raised eyebrow, receiving a candid shrug in response. There was no further information to be had from that corner. Rahab had no more idea of what the vampire was up to that he did.

The device, such as it was, didn't look like much when all laid out. Carefully pasted together, pieces of paper seemed to form a crude sort of triangle-shaped sack, which was in turn, attached to a shallow wooden cup by a series of thin wires. Where he'd found the wire, or the time to make the contraption in the first place, was anyone's guess. Raziel pushed himself upright to better witness his brother's antics.

When the next items produced from Melchiah's pockets were a flint, tinder, and bottle of lamp oil he hissed in dismay. "Do you have a deathwish?"

"I'm very careful with them!" Melchiah paused in his preparations to give him an exasperated look. "Even our sire says so… especially after last time…"

"God reserves a special portion of his love for fools and inventors." Rahab sighed softly at his side. "Go on then, Melchiah, but do try to avoid catching your cape alight?"

"You need help?" Raziel winced at the careless way his brother poured the oil, and then absently wiped his fingers on his cape.

One of these days the man really would set himself alite by accident, and there would be hell to pay. Not that he was enchanted by the idea of handling fire, but at least he was certain he'd be more careful with it than his occasionally over eager sibling. Melchiah waved that both he and Rahab might as well join in the upcoming carnage. Sliding off the roof, Raziel allowed himself to be giving the chore of holding half of the paper sack while Rahab held the other, lifting it out of the way of their brother's nerve-wracking attempts to catch spark with wool and wood shavings. Eventually a tongue of flame blossomed in the little bed of kindling, and using a spoon undoubtedly stolen from Vorador's collection of silver, Melchiah proved he could be careful when he wished as he gently lifted the burning litter up and into the oil filled bowl.

The heat from the tiny cup of flame was enough that Raziel could feel it on his fingers, even with the general chill of the night. He lifted his side of the paper bag and held it over the flames even as Rahab mirrored him. Seeing Melchiah's eager expectation, Raziel idly wondered whether the oil would burn out, or the paper in his hands spontaneously combust before whatever grand event his brother was waiting for would occur. Then Rahab hissed in evident surprise, and he looked down to be startled himself.

The bag was inflating slightly of its own volition, not only expanding, but actually growing buoyant in his hands. Raziel tentatively let go of his side, curious to see what would happen. Instead of fluttering earthward to be consumed by the flames, the paper stayed aloft, actually tugging at the wires attaching it to the bowl, straining upwards against gravity as it glowed with the light of the fire beneath it. Rahab likewise let go, and shuffled backwards a pace, watching with avid interest the results of Melchiah's latest foolery. Their younger brother didn't have their hearty appreciation of the inherent danger of his toys, reaching forward with deft fingers, he plucked the little bowl of fire up and gently held it in his palm, blowing a little on the flames to encourage them to flare higher.

All in a moment, the true marvel began. Melchiah dropped his hand away from his toy, leaving it suspended in mid-air. With no breeze to speak of, the little contraption of paper, fire and wood hovered quite easily without outside interference, even drifting upwards at a slow but measurable pace. Melchiah clapped for joy at his success, punching Rahab lightly in the arm and pointing at the cheerfully lit bit of paper floating over the rooftop. Rahab rubbed his short hair into a haystack in brotherly congratulations, eyes drawn upwards with a thoughtful expression as everyone else's were.

"Pretty." Turel commented laconically where he lounged against the roof, having bothered to open his eyes and watch once assured there would be no explosions. Zephon and Dumah both watched silently, not willing necessarily to compliment their brother, but unable to pretend disinterest at the unusual sight.

Raziel joined Rahab in ruffling his younger brother's hair. "Marvelous. What is it called? How did you come to think of it?"

"I read about it in a book." His brother offered deferentially, unwilling to take responsibility for the invention. "I just wanted to try it, is all. It's called a balloon."

"Hot air rises above cold." Rahab remarked abruptly, deducing at last how the feat was accomplished. Turning to his brother, he offered the fledgling one of his rare smiles. "Very clever."

"What's it do?" Zephon was obliged to puncture his brother's moment of happy pride by asking the obvious question. He glanced from uncertain sibling up to the glowing balloon and back again. "I mean. It's clever. I concede. But does it have a purpose?"

"I'm sure we could think of one." Raziel remarked quellingly to his younger brother in Melchiah's defense. "Besides, Turel is right, it _is_ rather pretty. Imagine what it would be like if we used colored paper… Or had several of them aloft at once…"

"… Forgive me if I don't find the idea of burning bowls of oil floating overhead to be very cheering, to be sure." Zephon pointed out one of the more severe flaws in the invention caustically as he lay back down, huddling next to Turel against the chill of the night.

Raziel grimaced, the man had a valid point. Suddenly he had a genuine interest in not just how the balloon stayed aloft, but how to expedite getting it safely down again.

"It'll burn off soon." His youngest brother sighed in exasperation, "It's just a toy… It's not going to set the house alight…"

"Even so." Rahab murmured soothingly, eyes also cautiously on their drifting spectacle as it wafted out over the gardens. "I don't think we should repeat this particular experiment in the dry season."

Raziel clapped his hand on Melchiah's shoulder again, offering him an encouraging grin. "We'll find a lake some time and you can make a really big one… we'll let it drift out over the water."

"Don't goad him into further folly." Rahab hissed softly behind their brother's back at him. Melchiah paid his remark no mind, eyes suddenly aglow with the possibility of building a larger balloon. Raziel simply shrugged, unrepentant, wondering if he should bid Dumah to fetch a slingshot so as to land the balloon safely on the pavement before it could drift out into the trees.

The inevitable exhaustion of the oil supply saved him from bothering. The flames fluttered and suddenly died for lack of fuel, leaving the balloon dark and defeated, sinking to earth with a soft clatter. Melchiah wasted no time in bolting down the steps to retrieve his successful treasure, undoubtedly with plans to modify it into an even more elaborate device in future.

Feeling his toes going numb with the lingering chill Raziel took one more glance upwards a the densely packed constellations before sighing in regret and motioning that he too was going down stairs, back into the mansion. The rest picked up and followed with minimal grousing, seemingly content to follow his lead for once. Undoubtedly someone would come looking for them soon if they weren't in the library ready to resume their more esoteric studies.


	13. Chapter 13

**Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King**

AU/continuation- fic of 'Defiance'

**The Beginning – Chapter 4**

- - - - - - - - - -

**K A I N**

After two-times-ten centuries of existence, Kain often found the constant need for sleep by young vampires and humans alike to be frightfully tedious at times. Not that he didn't occasionally give in to the urge to expedite the passage of the more monotonous hours and even weeks in a year by sleeping through them in mass, but he considered the absence from conscious thought to be more of a luxury than a daily necessity. So much time was wasted by those who lacked the stamina to stick with a line of reasoning until its natural conclusion. The constant interruption of 'rest' seemed to make already boring tasks linger forever.

Kain awoke scant hours after closing his eyes. Fully rested and refreshed from the nap, ready to resume his labors despite the mid-morning sunlight trickling through the shutters of his window. He lazed in bed a moment, enjoying the comfortable habitat that Vorador had semi-permanently loaned him at the mansion. The bed at least was decadence made-real, some occult combination of feathers and rags and sackcloth that managed the rare feat of being soft with out being irritatingly saggy. There was very little, other than his sword - resting in its crèche just past his fingertips - to personalize the space. Some books, some clothes, a tattered old banner, a particularly good etching of the ruined necropolis outside of Ziegsturhl; these were scant possessions for a man who claimed to be both Guardian of Nosgoth and future emperor.

Kain looked around, satisfied with his tiny domain. In a year's time he would be leading an army out towards Avernus, preparing to meet his foes, the Hylden, at the moment of their arrival. There was every expectation of living as a nomad for several decades after that. An army in the field couldn't afford to stay still long when their enemy could be expected to break through from their astral prison wherever opportunity allowed. He at least was prepared to live austerely. Vorador, he had a hunch, would never be quite comfortable when away from home. The old vampire tisked whenever obliged to enter Kain's room. Usually threatening to send an intervention's worth of fledglings in with furnishings and clothes suitable for not only a mere Guardian of Balance, but the Guardian of the Pillars. Kain grimaced and sat up, reaching for his clothes and dressing for the day.

He was as ignorant as anyone else as to 'why', but the Pillars seemed to have no need to call on individual champions of their own like before. Each of the nine edifices seemed perfectly content to share when it came to his guardianship. Kain wasn't sure if it was due to his status as the 'Scion' or whether it was something he had inadvertently done upon remaking the world. He wasn't inclined to worry; especially as the Pillars' downfall the first time had been division amongst the guardians themselves rather than physical attack. If they were willing - in their semi-sentient way - to put all their eggs in one basket, and bet on the fact that Kain would not be readily corrupted again, who was he to disagree with them? Even if he did, it wasn't like he could do much of anything about it. It wasn't like he had asked to be multitasked. He would have been perfectly content with Balance alone. Let some other poor bastard take on Conflict and the rest. So long as they did as they were told he would have had no quarrel with them.

There was a practical reason, of course, why Vorador didn't mind gifting him an apartment on the eastern side of the mansion for his own use. More than the prestige of having a 'Scion' in residence, more than the paranoia of wanting to keep him close to know what he was up to, was the simple fact that this particular corner's worth of property was the least-valuable in the building, at least as far as vampires were concerned.

Settling the Reaver across his shoulders as always, Kain moved towards the elaborate set of shuttered windows that dominated one wall of his room. It was simply a matter of positioning the handles correctly to open a door made of leaded glass panes, and release the bolt on the shutters behind it. A torrent of light and a draft of frosty air shocked him into full wakefulness. He exhaled in surprise and shielded his eyes until they adjusted to the sunlight beyond. Squinting into the sky, he could almost hear the elemental cry of dismay as the daylight slid over his skin without being able to burn him.

Only three vampires in the world were old enough to be able to find such an easy access to the outside world non-threatening in the bedroom. Kain smirked and stepping out onto his balcony, dusted some snow off the stone railing before leaning on it. The morning was unrelentingly white. The land was so bright as to be almost painful to look at, met at the high sides of the valley by an equally painful blue sky. If he had been human he would have been overjoyed at such a fine day. Kain could appreciate it on a philosophical level.

The winter was winding down, the days growing longer with each sunrise, but the season seemed determined to offer one or two final storms. Fresh snow must have fallen throughout the pre-dawn and early morning, for it lay two inches thick on the flagstones and packed into small drifts between the rail posts. He would have to take a broom to the area before sunset if he didn't want one of his idiot children getting a nasty burn from the moisture. The snow between his toes wasn't wet enough to do more than tickle him slightly as it melted on contact with his bare foot-claws. Kain inhaled deeply and admired the sleeping swampland around him. The morning was so silent he could easily hear the hunting calls of the hawks in the distant air above.

The balcony suite was scenic, but not for the faint of heart. Unlike Janos' rooftop retreat, Kain's rooms weren't sheltered by the shadow of the building adjacent. With the predominant winds in the valley blowing up against his side of the mansion, he was resigned to drifts in winter, and puddles of water in summer. Not to mention the old glass pane windows and weathered shutters that both dripped when wet and seeped daylight in the mornings. No fledgling in his right mind would desire quarters that could promise an inconvenient death in so many different ways on a daily basis. Naturally therefore, they were perfect for Kain. The inhospitable rooms saved him the trouble of discouraging visitors. It wasn't like he could be harmed by any of it anymore. Short of putting his head directly into the fire grate, he was immune to most vampiric household blunders.

Closing up the shutters to prevent accidents with early-rising vampires later, Kain passed through to his inner office and out into a wide hall of sorts. Originally it had been lined with random bits of decorative furniture and suits of armor, but all of the clutter had been stripped away months before and replaced with a sort of dormitory for its new inhabitants. Six narrow beds, three to a side, flanked the room. Each bunk was provided with a modest chest, desk and chair, should the fledgling that slept in it feel the need for storage or shelf space? Despite the utilitarian sameness of each little space, already there were signs of personality. Rahab's desk had a stack of books borrowed from the library. Dumah had obviously been working on oiling a piece of armor in his limited free time. Kain stopped at Melchiah's desk noting what had to be the beginnings of a toy catapult in the making. The young vampire was shaping up to be identical to his earlier incarnations, already contemplating mechanisms of some sort or another when left to amuse himself.

Walking down the row towards the room's other exit. Kain counted sleepers out of habit, and clucked his tongue in disgust at the last pair. On the left Turel slept like the dead, snoring softly. Whetstone and blade were left out on his desk. Kain reminded himself to scold the fledgling for not storing the weapon properly come evening. On the right was a messy pile of blankets that he had mistaken for his first-born, the vampire himself, clearly, no longer a bed. Kain pressed a hand to the evidently abandoned mattress, and found it quite cold. Wherever he had wandered off to, he had done it some time ago.

Raziel had no doubt gone to bed with the others. Trained as a group, they did everything short of bathe together. Kain firmly put his foot down at Janos' initial urge to assign private suites and a bevy of servants to each of the future warriors from the onset. They were already an unmanageable group of egos, only months old, if they didn't get in the habit of dealing with each other from the start, they never would.

He crushed their childish complaints with practiced authority, and soon even Vorador could see the sense in the level of discipline he required. Melchiah and Zephon were as capable as any of Vorador's yearlings within four months. Their elder brothers were already demonstrating skills and talents outstripping vampires five years older. The respect drilled into them was the only thing keeping them from becoming absolute egomaniacs. Kain rolled his eyes at the recent memory of Turel and Dumah battering at each other in the sparring ground until each vampire's armor broke under the other's blows. If he hadn't interceded, they'd have continued the wholesale slaughter on each other without the protective layers of steel until one of them lay dead. It would have been an amusing prospect if he had only needed _one_ of them, but as each had his purpose Kain had been obliged to intervene. The raw abilities were in place, what they needed was time to train and grow worldly before he took them out for their first serious skirmishes.

Raziel was one of the more biddable of the bunch, usually. Eager to learn, and already dexterous enough with the blade to spar with the best, he was almost silent by comparison with his more boisterous siblings. Kain found that he often took for granted that his eldest offspring would do as he was told, so often did the fledgling manage to get through a day without mishap. When Raziel did take it on himself to be wayward, it always seemed more startling by comparison. Kain frowned down at the rumpled sheets and stalked out of the hall. If the vampire had taken it on himself to wander off, there were some logical places one might check.

- - - - - - - - - -

There were ample paths for a vampire to choose when navigating Vorador's sprawling estate if one wanted to avoid the sun. The catacombs were readily accessible from every wing of the house through a variety of side entrances and staircases. A sensible fledgling knew the route down through the wine cellars and vaults well, even if they never rose early enough to see the sun. Rain fell in the night just as readily in the day, and it didn't do to be caught outside in a sudden squall.

The elder vampires, and more foolhardy fledglings would forsake the tame shelter of the earth in favor of strolling along the breezy causeways and courtyards that separated the different wings of the house. Kain eyed the patches of brilliant sunlight and blown snow that cropped up at regular intervals along the plaza. Telling himself that it was extremely unlikely that there would be a rather guilty looking pile of ash where his eldest had made a false step didn't completely quell the urge to check. Raziel might be in the midst of his impulsive youth, but he wasn't a complete fool, just a damned insomniac.

Not for the first time, Kain shook his head in silent dismay over how things had turned out. Raziel had always been somewhat 'special', even in his hazy memory of the vampire's earlier life. But this particular incarnation was just plain _odd_ at times. Whether he lay the blame on Raziel's convoluted – if forgotten - past life experience, or on his own altered nature transmitted to the fledgling with his blood, it didn't change the fact that at times his eldest was unmistakably eccentric.

Between his fundamental incapacity to succumb to the torpor that all fledglings did during daytime, his undeniable physical competence in all manner of daily tasks, and his ability to project an aura of world-weary wisdom when only months old, he was definitively different from the usual. The disparity between Raziel and the other former Saraphan was such that even his brothers could tell something wasn't quite right. As a result, Raziel stood a little apart from the group at times, for more reasons than simply his supremacy of talent.

Kain mused over what the changes meant while comforting himself that the important details stayed the same. With weapon in hand, Raziel was most commonly found standing with his brother Turel, the pair of them kindred in their cool headed approach to combat. When off the field, Raziel favored Rahab's company sharing a love of knowledge for its own sake with his clever sibling. The alliances that had long stood during the Dark Empire seemed ready to stand again. First, Second and Fourth against Third and Fifth. Poor Melchiah, always chosen last by either side, had never counted for much in their childish games of politics.

Except this time Raziel seemed strangely attentive to his youngest sibling, more than previously. Rahab historically had always been the one to extend a hand to his youngest brother, sheltering him in his indifferent way from Zephon's barbs and pranks. The quiet scholar still seemed so inclined, but in this iteration Raziel was more often than not at his side. With two such staunch protectors, even Dumah needed to consider carefully his bullying, and Melchiah seemed to flourish with the added support. Barely done teething himself, and already Raziel was a hero in his brother's eyes. Kain wished he'd paid more attention years ago on his first attempt at raising the mob. He couldn't be certain that what he was witnessing was genuinely different, or just a slight variation on what had always been.

Had Raziel ever been so earnest as a young vampire? Where had his youthful arrogance gone? Had Turel laughed for joy at his sillier sibling's antics? Ever? Rahab was still silent by nature, but in his watchfulness there was an undertone of drollery, even kindness, that Kain had not expected. Only Dumah seemed exactly the same to his jaded eye. Too thick-necked to appreciate a clever joke or care for a weaker creature, the young vampire was shaping up to be as much of a pain in the neck as he ever had been. Likewise behind Zephon's agreeable pretense, Kain could sense his second youngest already beginning to make up his own mind about whom he liked amongst his kin, and whom he could do without. Lumping the boy together with Dumah actually did both of them a disservice. It wasn't like the pair would ever collude against their siblings in an organized manner. Each had, and would have, his own agenda, too wrapped up in themselves to think to forge a lasting alliance with anyone else.

- - - - - - - - - -

Vorador's library was ensconced at the heart of the mansion. The lamp-lit labyrinth with it massive windows was often the hub of activity for the leaders of the cabal. Kain held court, such as it was, from the massive oak table that dominated the ground floor of the room. Reports and maps were stacked on the various desks and sideboards as the vampire leaders conspired to plan for the arrival of their ancient enemy.

During the daytime, the glass panes of the hall's enormous windows tinted dark via some enchantment their owner had instilled in them, making the room safe even for the youngest recruits. However it was not a popular retreat while the sun was up. Most of the soldiers and courtiers who made the mansion home slept until at least evening, if not until fully after sunset. Janos and Vorador tended to keep the same schedule, mostly because it didn't matter to them one way or the other. Any visitor to the library who dared the tinted shade would find it a lonely place. Kain personally preferred it in the mornings. He could work in peace for a few hours, then return to his rooms and nap if he felt the need, and awake again in time for his usual nightly activities.

Walking over to the main table, Kain noted some new papers had been left for him. He resisted the urge to flip through the news from across the continent in favor of looking into another curiosity that had caught his eye. His lost child was almost exactly where he had assumed he would be. Raziel's dark hair fell across his face as he rested his head on his hand, reading with silent intensity. The large text in front of him looked vaguely familiar, but that didn't mean anything in particular. Kain had read just about every book in Vorador's collection over the several iterations of the timeline he'd been obliged to plod through. It would have been surprising if there was a book on the shelf in Raziel's alcove that he hadn't at least flipped through at one point or another.

The plush carpet that Vorador favored hushed his footsteps entirely as he crossed the room. His child remained oblivious to his presence right up until the moment that he lifted a corner of the book to get a better look at the cover. Raziel jerked back in guilty surprise, almost losing his chair in the process.

"Sire! I just-"

"Be easy, child." Kain took the opportunity to claim the tome for himself, flipping through it briefly to remind himself of the contents. A socio-political treatise of particularly dry content, he remembered attempting twice, in his youth, to finish the volume only to give up half way through. His interest in economic principles had always been theoretical at best. "Basalt's 'History of Meridian'? You've set your self to some heavy reading, Raziel."

Kain looked down to assess his sleepless offspring. Guilty looks aside; Raziel appeared worn out and pale. Bruised shadows under the fledgling's eyes implied that this was probably not the only day he had been up and stalking the empty halls of the mansion lately. Kain chided himself for not noticing the latest bout of restlessness. He closed the book and set it back on the desk. "Perhaps best accomplished when not half asleep however. Did Vorador recommend this?"

"I wanted to learn more about human cities, and how they work." Raziel confessed. "He said I might as well learn about Meridian, since it was the most successful."

"Indeed?" Kain settled his hands on his waist, wondering what the old vampire's motivations were, and whether Vorador had been condoning his eldest's willful avoidance of sleep. "He has a natural partiality to the place, I suppose. Vorador calls it the 'Queen' of all cities in Nosgoth. Meridian is the first and finest amongst the city states and a gateway to the ocean and the uncharted world beyond." He smirked. "It is also a city not afraid of a little shameless self promotion. Read anything Basalt has to say with a critical eye, child. Don't assume that everything that is written is an absolute."

Raziel stared at the book with sudden distrust. "Should I find a more accurate accounting then?"

"I doubt if one exists."

Kain slid an appreciative claw-tip along the spines of the books lining the shelf nearby. They were all histories of one sort or another, many having to do with the metropolis to the south. Finger pausing on a particular volume, he tipped the dusty book out of its resting place to get a better look. "Ah, this might do."

He considered the thickness of the book with mild dismay, realizing he was only compounding the distraction that Vorador had provided, but added it to the desk anyway. "Some additional reading, should you tire of the first one. In the search for the livable truth, when given nothing but relative truth, a person can only seek out as many different opinions as possible in the hopes that the various biases will cancel each other out."

"Livable truth?" The fledgling looked up at him, perplexed. "But surely there is only one truth, and the rest are embellishments. What do you mean livable?"

"If there's one thing I've learned over the years, Raziel…" Another book caught Kain's eye, and he lay it down next to the other two. "It's that for every record of a given event, there will be a multitude of others, telling the story in a completely different light. Worse yet, there is bound to be one version that was never written at all, and can only be pieced together from understanding fully what the overall status of the world around the event was."

"But surely there are those who are able to sit and write an impartial account. Taking in all sides…" Raziel argued weakly.

"There is always something unknown, child. No one historian could know the thoughts and motivations of every player in a game. We are none of us gods, after all. Not even the vampires with all of our advantages are without bias and self-censorship. And human historians are more shortsighted even than us, since they are not in the habit of considering the events of their lives in terms of what will be relevant to their great great grandchildren. A century, to mere mortals, is an insurmountable obstacle to comprehend."

Looking down at Raziel tired face, Kain caught himself about to launch into a full lecture. The last thing the fledgling needed was to spend another twelve hours immersed in study after being tutored all night by his various mentors. He deliberately clamed the small stack of books and set them on the ledge behind the desk, resolved to nip this stubborn behavior in the bud. "As interesting as this all is, I cannot overlook my real reason for speaking with you."

His lieutenant had the grace to look guilty, shifting in his chair as if expecting to be banished back to the dormitory at once.

"I have told you before that you are to endeavor to fulfill your duties as a young member of this army, child." Kain spoke softly. "Additionally, you are to be a role model to your brothers, not all of whom find the call of duty as easy to hear as they ought."

"I have done all, my lord." Raziel grimly agreed. "Ask any of my instructors, and I am confident-"

"Yes, your teachers tell me you are most assiduous in your training and your studies." Kain sighed. "So why is it that the simplest and most natural things are for you, the hardest?"

"I don't intend to defy you!" Raziel protested in a vehement whisper, more to himself than to anyone. Staring at his hands as he clenched them against the edge of the desk, he looked the image of misery. "Truly, I compose myself for sleep as earnestly as any of the others."

"If you do not at least rest, child, how will you grow strong?" Kain asked. "Young as you are, you will not be able to keep up with this pace of training for long if you cannot manage yourself better. You must rest when given the opportunity. Surely you see that."

"How can I rest when my thoughts refuse to settle?" The fledgling asked helplessly. "I can only lay stupidly a bed so long before I must either get up, or go quietly mad with the tedium of it."

"Surely you feel tired," Kain mused. "You _look_ tired. Do you have some phobia in regards to sleep that I am unaware of?"

"I do not believe so," Raziel shrugged. "I swear that I was going to return to my bed within the hour, lord. I did not expect you to notice my absence."

"And my not noting it would have made the disobedience less?" Kain folded his arms across his chest and gazed down at his offspring, torn between amusement and annoyance at the childish logic. "Do you think my rules are solely for my own benefit?"

"No. No I didn't mean- I – I don't know what it is that I meant…" Tired, and defeated, the fledgling rubbed his scalp and tried to follow the argument. "I beg your pardon, lord. I am exactly as you say, overtired and disobedient. I will return now to where I should be."

"And will you sleep?" Kain found himself sympathizing.

Raziel made an eloquent face. "I will endeavor to, my lord."

"Meaning that you'll lay there all day pretending to sleep while your brothers' snoring slowly drives you insane." He surmised calmly, pleased to note another guilty look confirming his supposition. Kain relaxed his scolding stance and glanced about the room for inspiration. One of Vorador's implausibly delicate-looking gilded couches caught his eye.

"No, no. I think you're probably better off here, child." Kain found he didn't mind the idea of some company after all. Raziel was quiet enough.

"At least here I can keep an eye on you. It wouldn't do if you started sleepwalking on a day like today." Gesturing to the couch, he tried to not smile as he saw Raziel's relieved expression. "Take one of the books and settle yourself over there. I'll join you shortly."

It took a moment to gather his latest journal and inkpot; and a moment longer to grab the top few sheaves off the stack of reports and mass the entire bundle onto a small side table for transport. Carrying the bit of furniture over to the couch, Kain checked to see if anything was amiss and settled himself onto the ludicrous piece of upholstery.

Compiling trends of possible Hylden interference in realm of human politics was tedious at the best of times. At least Kain had the advantage of knowing what he was looking for. Unusual advances in scientific understanding, the rise of totalitarian or strongly anti-vampire regimes, increased supernatural activities, all the things he had encountered in his alternate futures were becoming prevalent in the world at large. The parasite still buried underground throughout Nosgoth certainly muddied the waters a little, the creature having its own anti-vampire agenda, but for the most part Kain was able to quickly rule out what wasn't relevant.

Half way through his first report, he glanced up to find Raziel still awake. Diligently flipping through the monstrously boring book, he was clearly trying to recover his place in it. Looking more exhausted than ever, Raziel rested his head against the armrest of the satin covered couch as he read.

"At least make an attempt to rest?" Kain asked ironically. "I have no interest in a child who dozes off mid-lesson, which you doubtless will tonight if you don't get some sleep soon."

"Yes sir." Raziel reluctantly set his book on the floor and attempted to compose himself for sleep against the arm of the couch. Kain watched the young vampire's face go slack, and sighed to himself. If the boy was still faking in half an hour, he would probably relent and put the fledgling to work sorting the inventory sheets for the army already bivouacked at Moebius' old keep. Turning back to his reading he let the minutes tick by, digesting the news from the world at large. Kain was certain he was being circumspectly watched from the other end of the couch, and for a few documents, resolutely forbore from glancing over to check the vampire's status.

Finally the sensation grew too annoying to ignore, but on looking up he found his eldest child to be feigning sleep with casual ease. Clearly this was something the vampire had been practicing, he noted grimly. He nudged the fledgling with a rolled up document. "You can stop pretending."

Sulfur yellow eyes promptly opened, a slight smile dancing in their depths. The brief attempt at rest hadn't seemed to help at all. Kain pondered knocking his stubborn child's head against the wall to aid him with finding a comatose state. The idea was entirely unfeasible, but hinted at another option. He reached out and caught Raziel's arm, pulling the young vampire gently towards his end of the couch. "My lord?"

"Let me try something." Kain felt a little foolish with what he was about to do, knowing that such an offer could only be seen as hopelessly sentimental. Practicality overruled any lingering pride however, and he resolved to provide assistance. Giving the fledgling another tug, he forced Raziel to settle next to him, shifting to accommodate the vampire's presence at his side. "If you can bear the indignity of using me as your pillow, I believe I may have a way of resolving your dilemma, child. There is one trick that has worked on you previously, although I have not tried it lately."

Raziel hesitated at the offer, tense at his side. "It is you who would be obliged to be undignified, sire. I would not inconvenience you with my troubles."

"Don't fuss. Just do as you're bid." Kain placed a hand on the back of Raziel's head, gently forcing the fledgling to rest his face along his shoulder. "Settle yourself for sleep and close your eyes."

Even as he moved to comply, the fledgling remained stiff, ready to bolt at a moment's notice. "Sir, I…"

"Sleep, Raziel." Kain overrode the doubtful commentary. "Forget the rest and sleep."

"I don't think I ca-" The fledgling interrupted himself with a yawn. Kain's compulsion transmitted both verbally and physically, took hold readily in his already tired mind. "Ah." Raziel sighed aloud, relief evident as he went limp against Kain's shoulder. All the fledgling's protests were forgotten as he relaxed at last. Raziel's eyes closed as he fell into a swift and welcome oblivion.

"Sleep, child." Kain murmured the command a third time, concentrating on overcoming the last of the fledgling's mental defenses, urging the notoriously light sleeper into a deeper slumber than was his norm. He was rewarded by another sigh, Raziel nuzzling innocently against his neck as he sought to curl closer. Listening to the steady rhythm of the vampire's heart, Kain found it no burden at all to have the fledgling draped against his side and chest.

There was something meditative in the feel of Raziel pressed along side of him, breathing against his skin. He belonged there, just as much as the Soul Reaver did. Kain gave the sword a mental nudge, curious to know its opinion on his sleeping companion. The blade barely flickered in response, as inert as usual. With every passing year the sword became more 'sword like.' More like it had been when he first had claimed ownership back in his youth. The spirit within was still there, undoubtedly, but it either slept too deeply, or was imprisoned too absolutely, to wish to communicate anymore. The Raziel he had known so well was almost entirely gone.

Kain couldn't help but tighten his hold on his 'new' Raziel, instinctively protective as he realized the awful truth of his situation. The fledgling was just as much the man he had loved, as ever the first one was. He could no more stop himself from growing attached than he could stop his own heartbeat. It only made what had to come more sublimely painful, since in a thousand years time, if all went _well_ he would have to let the vampire go, a sacrifice yet again for the greater good. To do anything but, would be to throw away all his efforts so far, not to mention damn the world to obliteration.

Realizing his grip would harm the fledgling; Kain moderated it slightly, sliding appreciative claws through Raziel's feathery hair to caress the back of his neck. Even the scent was the same, he realized with a jolt. Something in the clean masculine undertones of Raziel's skin brought back memories of a hundred previous encounters from his former life. It was so easy to forget at times, that this one wasn't his other Raziel, returned to him yet again. At times the identical way the boy tilted his head, or even simply gazed at him, nearly convinced him that there were not two Raziel's but one. The illusion was easily broken however. The fledgling would ask some innocent question, or do something foolish that only a fledgling might. Kain stroked the side of Raziel's face, enjoying their momentary closeness, and the relative privacy that daylight provided.

Eventually even the pleasure of Raziel's company –comatose as it was – wasn't enough to keep him from the necessary chores he had to do. He carefully balanced his notes and ink against the sleeping body next to him and continued updating his journal well into the afternoon.

- - - - - - - - - -

It wasn't surprising to see Vorador poking his head around the door as the gilt monstrosity of a timepiece in the hall chimed the three o'clock hour. The green skinned vampire had as little use for sleep as Kain did, but indulged in the pastime with lavish regularity. Then again, Vorador usually had other indulgences on the agenda when he retired in addition to simply napping. His latest 'wife' was no doubt sleeping off his tireless advances even now. Kain couldn't help but smirk at the ancient vampire's appetites as he waived the man over. Putting pen and reports aside, he found he was actually looking forward to a little company from someone who wasn't fast asleep.

"Anything amiss?" He asked as the green vampire drew up a chair.

"Since we last spoke?" Vorador gestured eloquently. "This age is not so energetic as that, Kain. Not yet at any rate." Glancing down at the dozing fledgling, the vampire bared his teeth in amusement. "I came down see if the young idiot was sleeping nose-first in a book like usual, but I see he's found a more agreeable place to nap."

"You shouldn't encourage him." Kain scolded. "The child's development will be hampered if he refuses to properly care for himself."

"Yes well we can both see how effective your harping to him in regards to duty and sleep has been these past months. I think you're just going to have to accept the fact that this one is going to be a special case." Vorador shook his head. "He's a day-walker, Kain. It's not unheard of. I've had a child or two myself that tended that way over the years. You can't change them just by shouting. They have to learn on their own how to balance their schedules in such a way as to cope with the urge to be up and about when everyone is sleeping and prone to napping when their kinsmen are awake. If he survives long enough, it'll be a damned-handy trait for him to have."

Kain snorted in annoyance at the open acknowledgement of his eldest's undesirable 'gift'. The fact that his insomnia wasn't unprecedented in general didn't change the fact that he didn't _remember_ it being a problem previously. Why develop such a dangerous habit now of all times? He could only point to Raziel's invariably contrary nature as the cause of it. When he most needed the boy to live as quietly and safely as possible, naturally the child's unconscious impulse was to embark on the most risky behavior a fledgling could find.

Vorador continued, ignoring his thoughtful silence. "After I found him haunting the corridors the third morning in a row I thought it would be best to direct him to a less dangerous method of whiling away the hours. Mid day explorations are hazardous to the health of the young."

"I see you gave him the driest, most moribund thing you could find on your shelves." Kain remarked, feeling slightly less annoyed by Vorador's interference. "Were you deliberately trying to bore him to sleep? Or did you think he'd actually get anything out of the book."

"Either way he would get something out of it." The vampire grinned, unrepentant. "Sleep or education; or at the rate he's been going, a little bit of both, but only if you believe in learning by osmosis. Shall I teleport him back to his bed where he'll be less of a nuisance?"

Kain ruffled Raziel's hair again, considering. "No, no let him stay as he is a while. It make no difference to my plans for the day, and this way I can guarantee he'll sleep the afternoon through for a change."

"As you like." Vorador's look was altogether too knowing for Kain's taste.

He suspected that at his age, he ought to be more thick-skinned about being gossiped about behind his back. The idea of Janos and Vorador taking bets when alone about how long he dithered before seducing his eldest lieutenant was irritating in the extreme. Perfect strangers laughing at his expense he could handle, having his supposedly nearest-and-dearest-kin sniggering at his dilemma was simply annoying. The urge to punch either or both of them in the face when they gave him 'meaningful' glances was becoming too strong to ignore.

It wasn't like he had resurrected the man simply to serve as his bed-warmer. Even in his decadent and devil-may-care past life, Raziel had always been his commandant first and foremost. Anything and everything else had only come about centuries later. Kain found the memories came all too easily. Millennia's worth of time hadn't dulled them nearly enough, blurring out the precise moments perhaps, but not the bone-searing passion. At the time it had been as much Raziel's seduction as it had been his own. Their lovemaking, like their dueling, had been ferocious, almost lunatic in its excess. He remembered it with no small amount of guilt.

To be fair, Raziel too held some of the blame for their mutual madness. The vampire had delighted in provoking him, and had known full well that he had no intention of restraining his more sadistic impulses. The whim to capture, conquer and claim his most formidable ally's body had been one he had given into many times. There had been savage delight in allowing his lover to attempt to thwart him, allow him to think he had the upper hand for once, and then crushing him utterly, forcing Raziel to surrender in both body and spirit to his strength. The pleasure had been all the better for the pain.

"Ruble for your thoughts?" Vorador smirked, interrupting his train of thought. Kain hissed softly at his old friend, perfectly confident that the vampire was able to guess the nature of his distraction. For a minute he considered the esoteric choice of currency, settling his traitorous embarrassment.

"Can a ruble even be found in this day and age? I had assumed they had passed beyond all memory."

"I'm sure Janos has one or two lying around." Vorador waved off the question. "Failing that? I have a kopek somewhere, if you're willing to exchange coinage equally obscure."

"The pair of you are like magpies." Kain shook his head in disbelief. "If it sparkles, you're sure to have one stored away somewhere."

Vorador studied the sleeping fledgling a moment, refusing to be distracted by the light banter. "You're going to have to do something about him eventually. You haven't exactly been discrete in your partiality. The others are bound to become jealous sooner than later."

Kain snorted in dismissal. "They'll be jealous of him regardless. The weak are always frustrated by the strong. Still, their feelings won't change anything. He is and will always be the eldest and best. The sooner they accept this, the better for everyone."

"And if they challenge him? Dumah, for instance?"

"Then Raziel had better win." Kain replied grimly. "I would be deeply disappointed with anything less."

"Five on one isn't exactly fair odds, Kain." Vorador pointed out.

"Five? Doubtful." He shook his head. "The youngest three are too clever for such a direct attack. And I doubt two of them would have the stomach for it regardless. At worst I would bet on two-on-one, practically a fair fight, considering the fledglings involved."

Vorador gave him long look, clearly weighing whether to call his bluff in regards to being indifferent to the outcome of such a fight. Holding his tongue on that account, he settled for wondering aloud, "And what of the boy himself, I wonder? What will he make if these constant moods of yours. You have a knack, Kain, of switching between ruthlessness and affection with little to no warning. Not only will it confuse him, but likely will alienate him in time. He'll end up just as warped as Sebastian and the rest, trying to please an impossible contrary like you."

"You would have me show less affection?" Kain gave Vorador an arch look. "Rather hypocritical, given your track record with new recruits to the cabal."

The green vampire hissed in frustration. "I would have you be more consistent, Kain. An impossibility, I suppose, but worthy of consideration. For his sake, if not for the rest of us."

Sitting back in his chair, he fixed Kain with a stern look. "If you desire him, or even simply just care for him, for pity's sake just do it honestly! You can't just go on cuddling him one minute, and then cavalierly leaving him to fend for himself as best he may in the viper-pit the next. He is either a mere pawn in your game, or a valued member of your inner circle. You can't have it both ways, and to try for it is more than a little childish if you ask me."

"Have you ever considered, Vorador, that I _do_ occasionally know what I'm doing after all these years?" Kain rubbed the bridge of his nose with a knuckle.

"In battle? Yes, I believe you do." The vampire conceded. "In scheming and plotting? You're second to none. In raising your fledglings, however… No, frankly I don't."

Kain rolled his eyes. "I am not trying to create a mere lover, old man. Nor am I aiming to create a sycophant, a servant, or a mindless soldier. The last thing I want is a hesitant fool who can do nothing without a 'by your leave'…"

He paused a moment, realizing to his surprise, that he was angry. Why should he have to explain what was perfectly obvious? Silently he wondered whether he was justifying his actions to Vorador, or to his own conscience. Often they seemed to be one and the same. He took a calming breath.

"What I am laboring to craft is something akin to an equal. I seek a vampire capable of standing beside me when my infant empire takes flight."

"And I suppose Janos and I are just… unwelcome tag-a-longs?" Vorador grumbled.

"I don't pretend, old friend, that you'll be at all interested in accepting a permanent post in my honor guard." Kain smirked at the green vampire's pained look. "You are far too independent minded, for one, and for another… we'd be at each other's throats within a year if we tried to set up government together."

"True." The man sat back in his chair, mollified. "Nine months of your company and I begin to doubt your sanity, then my own, then that of the world at large. You're an insufferable houseguest."

"Imagine how much worse it would be if we were co-rulers." Kain drawled. "It could never work."

"So you intend to groom this one for the roll?" Vorador cocked his head. "Have you told him of his elevated destiny yet?"

"Don't be daft." He snorted. "The child would become warped for certain, given a charter like that so soon. No he will learn of his future as it comes. There is no sense in rushing things. In the mean time he will hone his skills of diplomacy and intimidation by practicing on his nearest siblings, and learn to mind his back and watch for subterfuge by dodging his younger relations. He will gain an understanding of the world through study with you and the others… He will learn to trust his own instincts and judgment without the need for outside approval though what you consider my erratic parenting."

"I think you're mad. And I still say you'll drive him crazy as well." Vorador stood up with a sigh. "But who am I to interfere with the Scion of Balance. Do as you like! You always do anyway. If in three hundred years that boy declares you a lunatic and stalks off to never look back, just don't say I didn't warn you."

"Duly noted." Kain smirked. "Now be a friend and fetch me the rest of these," he held up the pile of reports. "On the way out?"

"Fetch them yourself." The old vampire groused as he swapped one sheaf of paper for another. "Demanding bastard." He shut the door behind him as he stalked off in search of saner company.

Kain snorted again and resumed his reading. The silence was refreshing after Vorador's testy presence, and there was ample time in the afternoon to enjoy the solitude before the usual crowd started to awake. Half way through the page, he paused, realizing that the silence of the room was different from before. A quick mental probe proved his hunch correct. In yelling at Vorador, he had relaxed the compulsion he had been carefully applying to the fledgling resting against his chest. He closed his eyes and cursed his old ally for the distraction.

"How long have you been awake?" Turning his head a little he was able to murmur the question right next to his child's ear.

Raziel shifted slightly resting his forehead along Kain's neck. "Not long. It's a wonder that the two of you don't come to blows, the way you fight all the time."

"We're both too old, and too respectable to go brawling in the courtyard every time we disagree." Kain chuckled. "Besides, we both know that I would win in any physical contest, so Vorador just lets me have my way before we get to the point of drawn swords, and spares himself insult and injury."

"Poor Vorador." Raziel murmured. Other than his minor fidgets, the fledgling seemed perfectly content with his resting place, his body a limp weight fitted between Kain and the couch's cushions.

"Poor Vorador? Poor me!" Kain protested gently as he used his free hand to stroke his lieutenant's hair. "That man is a hopeless pessimist. I don't know what he plans to do after the empire is founded, but I suppose if there's something to complain about he'll find it… or die trying."

"Janos says that he lived a very hard life before you saved the world." Raziel pondered aloud. "He survived both of the Saraphan crusades, and witnessed the collapse of vampire civilization. I suppose he has a right to be bitter."

"Do yourself a favor and don't ever tell him that." Kain suggested mildly. "He already has melodramatic tendencies enough, he doesn't need encouragement. Probably gets it from Janos. Honestly those two make quite the 'woe is me' pair."

Raziel shifted again, and daringly draped an arm across Kain's waist as he sought a more comfortable angle. "Would you rather I didn't heed their stories?"

"No, the tales of bygone oppression are valuable insight to the current situation. But I'd rather that you used your own judgment in regards to the fairness of the world, rather than adopt their opinions without question." He found himself rapidly letting go of any ill will. Raziel had that effect on him it seemed.

"Bias again?" The fledgling smiled against his neck. All but purring as Kain ruffled the young vampire's far too touchable hair.

"Go back to sleep, child." Kain eyed the tinted windows, gauging the level of the sun. "You have hours yet before you're supposed to be awake." The sub-vocal urging didn't catch quite so readily this time. Raziel yawned but did not drop off instantly.

"I want to be of use, lord." The vampire confessed quietly. "If it is your ambition, that I become worthy of aiding you in the ruling of an empire, I will do my utmost to be ready."

Flinching, Kain cursed Vorador again, and his own foolishness. "You overheard that too, of course... I would take it as a personal favor, child, if you forgot that conversation for the next several centuries. It wasn't intended for your ears. Especially as you are now."

"As you wish." Raziel agreed. "But Vorador is wrong. I am not afraid of what the future holds in store. Why should it warp me, or drive me mad?"

"You don't know enough yet to be afraid." Kain murmured darkly, thinking of all the events probably yet to come. "Tell me again in two hundred years, or in two thousand, whether you are still so optimistic. I think you may just feel differently."

"That may be so." Raziel's words had an edge of sleep about them. "But I will strive to achieve your will just the same."

"Sleep." Unnerved by the conversation more than he cared to admit, he waited until the fledgling's breathing had again settled into a predictable pattern. Alone again with his thoughts, Kain set aside the pages he had been reading, and brooded on the future.

- - - - - - - - - -

With the rains that came with the spring season the young ones were obliged to get their exercise in the halls of the Manor if they were to find any occupation other than reading to fill their hours with. Kain waited for a pause in the fistfight between Dumah and Raziel before stepping between them to navigate down the stairs. Stopping on the landing he turned to watch the various melee in progress with a practiced eye. His eldest might be light-footed enough to successfully manage a brawl on the thick carpets without mauling Vorador's mansion in the attempt, but his brother was leaving a clear trail of destruction in his wake. Several benches and ornamental tables were reduced to splinters with the muscular fledgling's overeager attacks.

Still for all the inherent violence of Dumah's movements, they weren't particularly effective when faced with prey that refused to stand and take it. Raziel ducked under yet another of his brother's wild swings letting the thick draperies take the brunt of the attack for him. Using the momentary tangle of cloth distract his brother, the lean fledgling smiled cheerfully as he belted his brother in the jaw in return. Dumah had not his brother's knack for dodging, and so took the blow full in the face with a sputtered curse. There was no evidence of Raziel's usual sleepy demeanor as he schooled his younger sibling in the art of humility. If anything his wicked grin was down right cocky, egging his larger brother to continue the fight. Kain shook his head at their childish pleasures, certain that win or lose Raziel would accomplish what was undoubtedly his primary aim, that of running Dumah ragged enough to stop the sulky fledgling's constant grumbling over the weather.

Further down the hall Turel was easily holding off both Zephon and Melchiah, alternately teaching and thrashing them when they did not heed him. Rahab sparred by preference with one of Vorador's 'grandchildren' instead of with his brothers. Pausing to watch a particularly passable pas-deux from his book-loving offspring, he nodded in appreciation of the boy's teacher. The swordsman knew his craft. Rahab was in good hands for the moment.

Never one to bring a man into the cabal by preference, the green vampire lord's many wives did the necessary chore for him, swelling their ranks by the dozens throughout the winter both in the Manor and at the Citadel with the results of their foraging for penniless-sell-swords and winter-starved yeomen from along the edges of the highways. The desperate men were pathetically easy marks despite their villainous reputations. All it seemed to take in most cases was an offer of a warm bed, agreeably furnished with the lady in question, for the men to offer any sacrifice. After they were embraced, well, what they didn't remember of their last bargain as humans wasn't to their detriment as vampires. Kain didn't care how the capable assortment of vampires came to join his army, so long as they did as they were told once enlisted.

The place was growing a little crowded, he supposed as he inspected the happy mayhem a moment longer. He'd have to make plans, once the weather dried out to shift west with at least half the crowd or risk overwhelming Vorador's hospitality completely. Janos might love the busy bustling nature of the Manor's current state, but he could see his longtime partner-in-plotting beginning to chafe at the imposition. Or if he wasn't yet, he definitely would be when he saw the state of his west wing when Dumah was done with it. Kain smirked to himself and left the children to their fun.

- - - - - - - - - -

"Someone's going to have to go north," the mansion's owner greeting him as he entered the study. Janos turned to favor him with a faint smile before resuming his gaze on the rainy gardens outside. Vorador gestured to the empty seat next to his desk and the piled papers before continuing his point to his maker. "It isn't a matter of wanting or liking, dear friend, but rather of tantamount importance. If the rumors are true…"

"And yet I still say we would _know_," Janos waived off his energy with a graceful gesture. "There is no way the Hylden could wander freely into this Dimension without the Pillars sounding warning."

"Not without help, at any rate." Kain agreed, raking the transcripts towards him to see what had changed to rile his esteemed co-conspirators so. "Demon sightings?" He raised an eyebrow in disbelief. "Inhospitable country, even for those brutes. It does seem unlikely."

"There, see?" Janos flipped his wings slightly as if to say 'I told you so' to his stubborn kinsman. "It must be something else."

"If it looks like a Hylden, and smells like a Hylden…" Vorador grumbled under his breath. Kain snorted in amusement, sharing the practical sentiment. "Regardless. Someone will have to go and look. Unless _you_ can work some grand geas, Kan, and scrye ahead to save us the bother?" The furred vampire gave him a droll look, not above teasing him for his various and often-unpredictable abilities.

Half the time Kain wasn't entirely sure he _could_ do something until he outright tried it. Part and parcel of being Guardian of Nosgoth, he sighed, sadly the position hadn't come with an instructional booklet for him to learn from, so he was obliged to make it up as he went.

He folded his hands across his with a casual shrug. "Send Umah, I suppose. She seems the most likely choice for such a lengthy outing. So long as she understands that she is to come _back_ and report about it if she discovers something overwhelming rather than to make a try for vainglory? I think she might make the journey without mishap, and be young enough to enjoy some of the hardships. It is time for her to expand her horizons beyond the southlands. It's time for us _all_ to expand our horizons, in fact. I'm thinking of leaving soon myself." Kain smirked at his companions' looks of surprise.

"You're taking your brood of destructive tyros with you?" Vorador mused speculatively, politic enough to not sound overjoyed, at least to his face. "Well it would make sense to continue their training at the Citadel, I suppose. They're ready enough to stretch their wings."

Janos actually managed to appear disconsolate at the news. "It is not as though they will be beyond reach. I shall be sure to fly over and continue my instruction to those whom are interested in lore."

"Rahab will appreciate that. I'm sure." Kain agreed mildly. The old fortress was a war-camp, and Moebius' old nest as well. He didn't suspect that the peaceful sage would enjoy his time there enough to want to stay over-long. "We leave at the end of the season, when the dry sets in." He continued to Vorador. "By then it will be that either _we_ go, or I think you will _throw_ us out."

"Attacking my house for the sake of their own entertainment again, are they?" The green furred vampire hid his face in his hands in a gesture of despair. "I'll dispatch some of the servants to clean up after them come morning."

"You have to admit, it _is_ amusing to see Dumah in all his pride getting knocked silly, even if it does cost you a vase or two." He shrugged again at his old friend. "It's not like you put out the expensive ones anymore."

"Turel?" Vorador guessed idly, expression lighter as he considered the not-infrequent source of Dumah's defeat.

The pair of brothers being of a height, and strength with each other, but the elder holding the critical degree of cleverness that his sibling lacked. Dumah frequently baited his elder brothers into sparring with him, but Raziel's easy-going demeanor often meant he, the eldest, was difficult to goad. Turel therefore was the one more often crossing swords with his brother, their tempers just enough alike that he was susceptible to his junior's taunts. It made the news that it was Raziel this time who'd succumbed to the temptation to lay into his thick-necked sibling all the more enjoyable. Kain shook his head, letting Vorador know he'd guessed wrong.

"Rahab then. Although it does no credit to his reason, picking a fight with that titan." Vorador countered. Next to him Janos made a disapproving noise.

"Raziel." Kain gave up on the guessing-game, not wanting the vampire to run through every member of his fledgling family.

"Raziel?" Vorador's eyebrow bent upwards, forming a disbelieving arch. "How on earth did Dumah manage that? Why would he want to? The child is not exactly the most energetic of you brood. Even if Raziel was gung-ho for it for once… It'd be like watching a jaguar fighting an enraged ox."

Vorador chuckled at his own joke a moment before shaking his head in dismay. "The lad moves well, I grant you, but it'll only take one hit from Dumah to knock him on his ass. Raziel has a third-less his weight!"

"They've been at it for the better part of an hour." Kain replied, well pleased with what he had observed in that time. "Your 'ox' has yet to land a solid hit, and has gained several bruises for his efforts."

"Truly?" Vorador looked at him in surprise before standing up from his desk, energized by the news to go see the marvel for himself. Watching as the old vampire swept the wrinkles from his velvet coat, Kain smirked again as he reconsidered. More likely, the old reprobate just wanted to see the damage Dumah had wrought while sparring with his laid-back brother.

"Well done, Raziel." Vorador mused to himself as he held the door for his maker. Janos too it seemed was not above a little curiosity over the battle taking place in the west wing's upper hallway. "I've always taken him for a bit of a dandy, honestly."

- - - - - - - - - -


	14. Chapter 14

**Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King**

AU/continuation- fic of 'Defiance'

The Beginning – Chapter 5

_* * * * *_

R A Z I E L

Raziel awoke to a strange tinkling sound. Laying in the dim hall, he held his breath to listen better. The snores of his brethren all around him were easy to discern, but otherwise the mansion was as silent as ever. His fingers itched with unnamed anxiety as he sat up. The hour was, as usual, positively unpardonable, practically noon. He listened carefully for a moment, wondering if the rains that had swept the bog had cleared off or not during the morning. Springtime had brought uncomfortably humid weather, and an uncommon amount of precipitation. He'd lost count of how many nights it had been since they'd last been able to go outside comfortably. Slipping out of his bed, Raziel silently dressed and glided down the hall past the other sleepers. It had become habit on waking to check to see whether Kain was asleep or out and about in the house.

Despite his sire's reluctant acceptance of his daytime habits, he did not like to flaunt his disobedience if he didn't have to. Bumping into the kindly Janos was usually no worry at all. The ancient vampire always was willing to make time to speak with him about eons past and never failed to inquire after his health and happiness. Meeting with Vorador was a bit more worrying since the gruff lord was inclined to not forget their first daylight encounter.

Raziel still cringed at the memory of his own foolishness. Vorador had good reason to worry about him, apparently. He hadn't meant to do himself harm, but there had been something so enticing about the sparkle of sunlight on the floor. He had thought that just a finger tip couldn't be harmful. Getting unexpectedly yanked back by the collar and shaken like a puppy had half scared him to death. The memory of the green vampire's subsequent tirade had been enough to keep him hidden in his dormitory for several days after. Only the extremity of boredom had made him risk another scolding of that magnitude. Still, the mansion was safe enough, even at daytime, for a sensible person. He carefully avoided the more dangerous rooms and explored whatever else he could. Vorador had even warmed to him after finding him flipping through the books of his library, deciding they were kindred spirits after all.

Raziel crouched down at the door to Kain's inner office, peering through the keyhole to see if his lord was within. The room was dim save for the lit sconce, no windows to worry a young vampire. It was impossible to tell if the bedroom beyond the inner door would be in use however. Raziel had a healthy respect for his sire's acute hearing, as well as the massive windows that adorned the wall of his sleeping chamber. But caution behooved him to check at least, before wandering arbitrarily throughout the house. The office door wasn't locked. There was no need of it. Kain's rule strictly stated that they were not to disturb him when the doors were shut. His punishment would be unpleasant, but not extreme, if he was caught.

Luckily the hinges were well oiled. Raziel wondered if they made a noise beyond his ability to hear as the door swung silently open. But if that were true then even now he was already overdue a scolding, so he might as well finish his spy work. Stepping into the office, Raziel paused a moment, confused. There was a strong smell of incense in the air, a cloying sweetness that choked in his throat and made his eyes water. Suddenly he had a powerful urge to lie down on the thick carpet and rest a moment. The need for sleep came on so suddenly, he wondered if he had been compelled by Kain himself.

He staggered and sank to his knees, feeling ill from the heaviness in the air. The scent was worse closer to the floor; a draft from Kain's bedroom pushing the noxious cloud under the gap beneath the door. Daring to inch forward, Raziel forced himself to set an eye to the inner keyhole, wondering what dark sorcery Kain was working.

The room was surprisingly bright. He winced and pulled away, fearing the sun, but soon realized it was a matter of comparison. There was no direct light on this side of the manor after mid-morning, and the weather had forecasted to be cloudy if not actively wet. Looking through the small hole again, his eyes rapidly adjusted to the relative brightness, allowing him to wonder at how it was that Kain's shutters were ajar, one side of the protective wooden barrier having been pulled slightly away from the windows, allowing the slice of muted light into the room.

It was unheard of for the vampire lord to forget to close and latch the shutters. Kain himself was supposed to be immune to such indignities, but everyone else had cause to worry. A flutter of movement between the open shutters caught his attention, a gloved hand reached in through the gap in the wood, and then through a broken pane in the glass door, to retrieve a little lantern of sorts. As soon as the antique device was pulled out of the room, Raziel found his breathing became easier. The smell of incense hung steadily in the air, but did not grow any worse.

Clearly there was evil at work. All instincts pointed to the fact that whoever was on the balcony, they had no business there. Craning his neck to try and get a better angle, Raziel couldn't tell if Kain was in the bed or not, but a flickering glow from the silk-padded box beside the mattress implied the Soul Reaver was present, and where the blade was, its master was sure to be as well. Why didn't the vampire stir? Surely Kain would rise and challenge the interloper?

Suddenly he realized that the incense itself was a weapon, and he had very nearly been its second victim. Glancing around, Raziel looked frantically for a blade or weapon in the office. His master's simple style of decorating confounded his hopes of finding a spear or even a dagger laying handily nearby. Raziel didn't dare run back down the hall to where his own weapons were hung. Fledgling that he was, he still had his nails. And despite Kain's repeated strictures to never touch the soul stealing blade, he was confident his lord would forgive him if it was the only thing available. With no time to run for Vorador and raise the alarm, he charged the door with his shoulder, bursting into the smoky room.

"Halt where you stand! Make no move!" Raziel's attempt at a forceful shout was hampered by the full force of the poison in the air. Doubling over, he wheezed as the vapors tried to disorient and subdue him.

"Well well. What have we here? A puppy pretending to be a guard dog?" Wrapped from head-to-foot in fabric and leather the intruder chuckled slightly. "How unexpected. How is it you're not asleep, boy? Are you a human pet?"

Raziel couldn't help but fall as a fist like a lead pipe connected with his head. He blinked to clear his eyes as he felt the vampire, for the strength was beyond human, crouch to give him a closer look. The interloper stared at him with yellow eyes for a long moment before placing a hand clinically on his chest. "You reek of Kain! Well well. The rumors were true. Hail and well met, little brother. Are the other fledglings near by as well? Perhaps we can make this a little family reunion. You can introduce me to them after I kill Kain. It is only fitting that all of you join your maker in death."

"Never." Raziel rolled out of the reach of the vampire's long claws and came to his feet, despite the pain in his head. "Kain!" A quick glance down at the bed proved his worst fears. The huge form of his master _was_ sprawled out on the bed. His sire's chest rose and fell in slow, labored breaths. "Kain!" He tried to rouse the vampire, rapidly realizing the seriousness of the predicament.

"He can't answer." The assassin chuckled. "He can't even hear you." Drawing a sword, the black clad vampire circled the bed. "The old bastard is off and dreaming of hell, or where ever he spawned from. Soon that will be all he's capable of doing."

"Who are you?!" Raziel feigned retreat, trying to buy time even as he shifted minutely to get a grab in at the dreaded Soul Reaver. The sword flickered faintly in its resting place, looking more malignant than ever. Maybe it knew somehow that its master was in danger. "Why are you here?"

"Who am I?" The vampire drew back, surprised. "Can't you guess? Does not Kain even remember the Nemesis he created years ago?" Seeing Raziel's bafflement, the man stood up straight and hissed in disgust, pulling off his hood to reveal a lean faced man with hair pulled back in a long tail. "I am Faustus, you little fool. Second born of your pathetic family. Raised, abused, and forgotten, along with my two brothers. We swore we would avenge our defeat, and today I shall drink my sire's blood to the last drop and leave his pathetic corpse as a warning the rest. This world will soon be ours!"

Taking a breath, the man coughed at the noxious atmosphere in the room. "I am half tempted to let you live after all, little brother. Just to remember who it was who brought your master low."

"Faustus." Raziel shifted again, taking advantage of the distraction in his opponent. "Faustus….Faust…. Oh wait. I do remember having heard of you, once, from one of Vorador's human servants. You were some sort of pathetic half-wit of a nobleman that Kain once took pity on and elevated. In return you betrayed him to the Saraphan after the end of the Second Crusade, and barely escaped with your skin intact. I heard your army was butchered like pigs just outside of the gates of the city by a mere handful of the cabal. The great 'Third Crusade' of the Saraphan Knights. What a joke."

"You little shit." Faustus promptly forgot his evil plans for the drugged vampire in front of him in favor of glaring at Raziel. "You useless, ignorant little catamite! I don't know how it came to be that you're awake, fledgling, or how it is that you can stand this foul smoke without being affected. But mark words, little brother, you are going to die in agony! I'll cut you apart slowly on top of the body of your dead sire for your slander. What do you know of anything?"

"Kain!" Raziel dodged as the sword struck out at him with serpentine speed, hissing as the edge cut deeply into his arm. The weapons masters who trained with him were centuries older, but usually kept their movements to a reasonable pace when sparring out of consideration for his novice reflexes. This vampire had no such strictures, and easily leapt the bed to trap him.

"Kain!" Raziel cried loudly, trying to rouse the sleeper. He had no choice but to dive across the bed to avoid another lethal thrust. His lord barely grunted as he slid over the sleeping vampire's chest. The maneuver did little good. Faustus was capable of moving faster than his eyes could follow. Caught by the neck, Raziel was hauled into the air, fingers scrabbling at the clawed hand that was slowly choking him. His nails could break the vampire's skin, but the muscle beneath was almost impervious to his efforts. Sinking his short claws in as far as he could he wondered if the assassin even noticed the pain. The scratches he made into the hand around his throat seemed to heal almost as fast as they were dug.

It occurred to Raziel with strange clarity that he might actually die. Physically he couldn't match the fiend dangling him in the air. His only hope was to somehow trick the bastard, or at least delay him and hope that someone heard their scuffle. Willing Kain to awaken and help him didn't have any more effect than calling him had previously. He gritted his teeth and forced the words out through his constricted throat. "Coward, you only dare challenge him when he cannot fight back!"

"Coward am I?" Faustus laughed cruelly, lowering his arm so as to get a better look. Raziel's neck felt minor relief when he was able to take up some of his weight on his boot-tips, the older vampire perfectly content with holding him just barely off of the floor. He didn't dare release his two handed hold on Faustus' wrist however, knowing how easily the creature might haul him upwards again. His neck already felt half snapped, Raziel had no interest in feeling the reality first hand.

The vampire seemed to enjoy his distress, squeezing slightly to emphasize his supremacy. "Ah yes, I know your type, infant. All talk and honorable intentions aren't you? I've killed hundreds just like you before, all of them prating on about rules of engagement and honor among warriors. It's all bullshit you know. All of it."

Suddenly talkative, Faustus bent his arm, bringing Raziel close enough to whisper conspiratorially. "All that matters is that I am strong and you are weak. I will win and you and your pathetic master will lose. I will go down in history as the mightiest vampire in the world. Mighty enough to kill even the 'Eternal Kain'. And you? You won't even be a footnote. All Janos and that green bastard will find later is a smear of dust on the carpet once I open the shutters and walk out. So tell me, weakling, just what is it about _you_ that is better than me? I mean, look at you! Here to save your lord? What a joke. What can a pup like you actually _do_ to stop me?"

Never having encountered madness up close, Raziel found staring into the older vampire's eyes to be almost mesmerizing. On the one hand, Faustus was entirely correct, he should have never attempted to thwart the assassin on his own. His successes on the training ground meant nothing when compared to the reality of combat with a superior foe. Outclassed he might be, but that didn't make him powerless. Like Dumah, this vampire's greatest weakness seemed to be his overconfidence. Knowing it to be his only chance, Raziel let go of his death-grip on Faustus' wrist, and wildly lashed out with all his remaining strength. His claws, fledgling though they were, bit deeply into Faustus' jeering face, raking him from temple to jaw on the left and leaving a bloody ruin where the man's eye had been.

The vampire screamed in agony, flinging him away as he clapped both hands to his face and howled. Raziel collapsed against the far wall and crumpled to the floor. Dazed as he was he gasped and lay half-amazed to find his neck not broken. One glance at his stalker's ruined and furious expression and he knew he wasn't saved yet. Faustus was hurt, but he was by no means defeated. Raziel scrabbled to his feet, all but tripping over himself as he staggered to the bed.

Even with the commotion, Kain barely stirred. "Kain, please!" He demanded hoarsely, daring to reach out and shake the arm closest to him. "Kain, you must get up!"

Faustus' howling abated to a sort of whimpering snarl as the initial shock of his maiming wore off. Blindly reaching for his sword, the vampire recovered the lost weapon and swept it in front of him as his remaining eye tried to focus.

"You- you little… What's your name, dearest brother? Tell it to me so that I may curse it for the next century while you writhe in hell!"

"Raziel." He hissed back, preparing to lunge for the only weapon at hand. "First born of Kain's true offspring and heir to the empire yet to come!"

"First? I think you mean fourth." Faustus kept one hand pressed to his skull, blood seeping between his fingers and down his face and arm. "Or the nothing-th once I am through with you, meddling fool!"

Raziel sprang for the Soul Reaver even as Faustus' outline blurred. His fingers closed around the hilt but before he could lift the mighty sword, a searing pain lanced through his chest. Looking down, he stared in horror at the foot of steel protruding from his stomach. Behind him the vampire laughed darkly and shoved the weapon in further. Raziel couldn't keep from crying out. The very breath felt as though it was forced from his lungs. To his ears his own voice sounded weirdly echoed. The Soul Reaver shivered and moaned in his grip, seemingly sympathetic to his distress. The agony was immediate, but not so crippling as he might have thought. He still had control of his arms and his wits. In a fit of desperation, Raziel hauled the soul-stealing blade out of its resting place. Despite its length, the sword felt feather light in his grip, allowing him to hold it, even one handed. It shouldn't have been possible for him, Raziel marveled, clearly the sword _was_ magic.

For a moment, they both stared in amazement at the flickering edge of the sinuous sword. Even Faustus had been conditioned to never touch the weapon, for he seemed as startled at Raziel's presumption as Raziel himself was.

As if aware their awe, the Soul Reaver chose that moment to announce itself to the world at large. With barely a whisper of warning, it ignited in a baleful white blaze and screamed with a voice like a thousand tormented banshees. Faustus staggered back with a shout of horror, shielding his remaining eye from the light and abandoning his prey in favor of saving himself. Raziel turned to follow but found the room suddenly unfamiliar. Ceiling, floor and walls seemed confused, each bending and bleeding into the other. Windows mere footsteps away suddenly stretched to an impossible distance, and just as suddenly seemed far too close, as if reality was attempting to fold itself inside out. Faustus did his best to navigate the nightmare. Throwing himself forward and half falling, half crawling, he made his way to the balcony.

Raziel knew he was getting away but couldn't seem to coordinate any will to move. The Reaver's flame was indescribable, beautiful and terrible at the same time. He knew in his bones that picking up the blade had been a mistake. The very wrongness of it was what caused the weapon to shriek in dismay.

The Reaver was meant for Kain and only Kain. No other had any business trying to pick it up. He opened his mouth to apologize, to try and explain his need, but no words could come to him, his vocal chords felt frozen with the shock that rooted him to the floor. The sword twisted and writhed in his grip as if it wanted to escape him, and yet at the same time seemed to be draw forth his very will to live. The magical fire on his arms felt supremely cold. Numbness offset the burning pain in his chest where Faustus had abandoned his sword.

"Raziel!" Kain sat up from the bed as if stung, staring at him in visible alarm. "Raziel, drop the blade!"

"I can't!" He choked out as he realized the truth of it, suddenly finding his voice. His fingers felt as though they were welded to the hilt. The cold fire would consume him just as it was meant to consume his master's enemies. The weapon screamed defiance, its voice drowning out any attempt at rational thought. Through his elbow he could feel the blade's fury and its desire to return to Kain.

Not normally aware of the emotions around him, Raziel stared at it in alarm. Somehow he knew, the sword wasn't angry with _him_ but with Faustus, with the one who had threatened its bearer. It would use him, he realized. The blade was riffling through his thoughts even as it chilled his body, taking control of his muscles and bones, even the beating of his heart. It wanted Faustus, and it would use him to get to the man. Its metallic consciousness focused on the traitor's rapidly fleeing form. Motivated by an impulse beyond his control, Raziel turned towards the balcony. His own injury and the daylight just beyond were irrelevant. The blood traitor would be made to pay.

"Raziel! No!" He felt a tremendous weight tackle him from behind, forcing him to the floor. The shock of the impact did what he could not. The soul eating blade jarred loose from his hand and skidded across the polished wood. Its fire extinguished the moment their connection was broken. He hadn't the attention to notice, wailing in renewed agony as Faustus' sword – momentarily forgotten in his chest- did him further damage still thanks to Kain's weight on top of him.

The room stopped trying to fold in on itself at least, he realized as he panted on the floor. Finding the strength to open his eyes, he looked over at the now silent Reaver blade resting by the window, and marveled at what sorcery was contained within.

"What the hell just happened?!" Kain's voice sounded loud, in the sudden quiet. Everything seemed so much louder. He swore he could hear his sire's alarmed heartbeat as the vampire urgently shifted off of him to better examine his injury. The repetitive flap of enormous wings could only be Janos circling outside. He tried to focus on his sire's question but found it hard to form words to respond. "Hush, child. Lay still, before you tear yourself completely in two."

Raziel wanted to apologize, his overactive senses allowing him to feel Kain's worry and distress. The sword came out of him with an unpleasantly wet sound, and was cast aside without a glance to join the Reaver on the floor. "Vorador!" Kain roared towards the direction of the open door. "Vorador, I need you! Now!"

His master's enormous hands grabbed at the edges of his wound pulling it closed with gentle claws. The old vampire muttered arcane words as blood flowed over his wrists and tickled down Raziel's side. He blinked in confusion, welcome numbness replacing the pain again. Closing his eyes, he was more than ready to obey the silent command as Kain bid him sleep. Sleep was what he craved. His sire was alive and awake, he could rest knowing that and leave the rest to others better suited.

* * * * *

K A I N

Kain cursed the alarmingly large pool of blood forming under his fledgling's torn body and fought to keep calm despite the horrifying awakening he had just had. Why the idiot child had gotten into his room when he was napping, and why the fledgling had thought to grab for the Reaver was a mystery in need of solving. All these were trivial in the face of the massive abdominal wound the vampire was sporting. And then there was the smell. Kain labored to halt the worst of the bleeding still trying to piece together the chaos, when the shutters were flung back with a bang, Janos calling his name urgently from outside.

"Careful you damn fool, there's a fledgling in here!" He barked, leaning forward to shield Raziel as best he could from any inadvertent contact with sunlight. Up to his elbows in the fledgling's vital fluids, he was not in the mood to tolerate the ancient's well meant interference.

"It's alright, the day is quite overcast." Janos squeezed through the glass doorway looking agitated, "I heard the Reaver, Kain. What happ-" Finally noting the calamity in progress, the blue skinned vampire swore in an ancient tongue and knelt next to the wounded fledgling, paying no mind to the blood puddling on the woodwork. "Raziel!? What on earth have you done?"

Kain snarled at the accusation. "What have _I_ done? I have no damned idea! I awoke to the Reaver screaming murder, and found this damn fool had picked it up."

"He wouldn't! He is no traitor! There must have been a reason." Janos' magic was superior to his own, especially with his wits badly rattled. Finding himself no longer needed, he sat back and tried to take stock of the situation.

"I think he was attempting to defend himself." The air was giving him the mother of all headaches. Kain shook himself, finding the lingering torpor unsettling. "God what is this stench?!" Seeing that the clouds were as thick as the ancient said, he dared to open the remaining shutters and windows, venting the entire suite out onto the balcony. "It smells like a crypt's worth of rotted flora in here."

"Helena's Marigold." Janos hissed mysteriously, not looking up from his work. "The child needs blood to replace that which he's lost. Do you have a jug handy?"

"I don't make a habit of eating in bed." He looked askance at the old man. "Where the hell is Vorador?!"

"Here." The green vampire strode into the room, holding a bloody rag. "Sorry for the- dear god is that Raziel?!"

"We need blood, fresh, at least two jugs." Kain overruled the repetitive strain of conversation. "I'll explain when you get back." All but pushing the startled vampire out of the room, he knelt next to his comatose child, only slightly relieved to find that Janos' skills had mended the life threatening aspects of the wound. "I would give you mine, boy, if I thought it would help," he murmured, brushing a lock of damp hair away from the fledgling's clammy skin.

"Too strong." Janos confirmed quietly. "Maybe in a day or so, once he has recovered a little, but I would recommend something less occult for the moment."

He nodded quietly and stood again, too anxious to remain in one place for long. The fresh air was doing wonders for his head, and in looking around, he found ample evidence now that his frantic worry had abated. "How did you get in, Janos? Did you break the shutter?"

"It was already open." The blue skinned ancient followed his gaze now that his initial task was complete. Raziel's head was pillowed in lap, but he shifted a wing to get a better look. "It wasn't you?"

"No." Crouching, Kain picked up a piece of broken glass and sniffed it gingerly. "Nothing there… but this is how they got in."

"They?" Janos frowned. "Then this wasn't your doing?" He gestured weakly down at Raziel's sleeping form.

"Why in the seven hells would I disembowel my firstborn?!" Kain snarled, "Do you honestly think me that much of a lunatic?"

"I don't know what to think, Scion! I heard the Reaver cry out! I came here and found the boy! What other possibility was I supposed to hypothesize?"

Vorador returned just in time to find them both hissing at each other, and hissed himself to get their attention. "Before we fall upon one another like rabid foxes… May I first administer this to the child?"

Kain turned back to the window, fighting for rationality while Janos claimed the first ewer and continued his nursing. His eyes swept the usually unremarkable flagstones, and noted the bloody smear on the railing, the extinguished lamp, and the Soul Reaver, laying forlornly where it had been forgotten. He cursed himself and scooped it up, sliding it home into the sheath on his back. Kain felt better almost immediately, always feeling more in control of a situation with his weapon at his side. The idea that he had almost lost it, or more importantly, lost the soul meant to inhabit it, gave him chills. The temporal distortion had been very real. The stomach churning sensation, more so than the Reaver's protests were what had dragged him from the depths of sleep. Some experiences one just didn't forget over the years.

The Reaver felt no worse for the wear despite his momentary lapse in ownership. He tested its aura carefully with his mind, seeking any sign of the furious wakefulness it has exhibited a moment before. The boy's touch had undoubtedly provided a catalyst for the soul trapped within the sinuous blade, he had felt for a moment not one Raziel's presence, but two. The fledgling's spirit all but lost in the wash of powerful emotions from his favored weapon. There was no sign of the upset now, however. Kain grimaced at the disjointed impressions he got from the sword, a sleeper awakened before its time, it was unwilling or unable to remain so for long. The petulant burst of irritation he felt from the blade at the disruption if its rest almost made him smile in spite of the nearly catastrophic turn of events. Muttering its displeasure, the sword seemed content to once more rest against his spine, its presence and steady warmth providing him something to ground himself against in the middle of the chaotic afternoon.

A second sword caught his eye as he turned back towards his disheveled room and it took him a moment to remember how he'd plucked it from his lieutenant's side and cast it away mere moments before. Blood smeared nearly the entire length of the elegant weapon. He picked it up and sniffed delicately, recognizing the unmistakable tang of Raziel's essence. The question was where had the weapon come from? And what kind of unmitigated bastard would want to impale his favorite child with it?

"Vorador." He caught the vampire's attention. "Is this one of yours?"

"No." The nobleman didn't even bother to take the weapon up to inspect it. "But I think I know whom it might have belonged to." He pulled free the rag he had stored in his belt loop and offered it to Kain for inspection. "I got two claws into a fleet-footed shadow out on the grounds a moment ago, and came away with this. Hence why I was delayed. You might find it interesting."

Taking the rag in hand, Kain turned it over a few times, trying to comprehend its nature. "A bit of sleeve from the look of it? Someone bled on it. Raziel perhaps." He sniffed at the still damp residue, and the smell didn't immediately register. A fleet footed vampire with gaudy taste, had trespassed the grounds at daylight to try and kill Raziel? It didn't make any sense. And then, just as quickly, it did. Kain let his eyes drift again to the broken pane of glass, and the bloodied sword. He felt surprisingly calm at the shocking news, "Faustus."

"Faustus." Vorador growled in agreement. "I caught a whiff of him out in the garden, and went to investigate, but by the time I figured out where he was, he was already fleeing as if his tail was on fire. How that boy learned to move so fast is beyond me."

"It was his gift." Kain murmured, not feeling any antipathy towards his old friend for not being able to run the vampire down. Not many could. Even he would have had to resort to laying a trap, most likely. Faustus was fast, but criminally stupid. "Faustus was here. Faustus tried to kill me? What was that damn fool thinking of?!"

"Probably of revenge."

"But that was decades ago!" Kain shook his head. "It's a little belated to be bitching about the failed Saraphan crusade now, don't you think?"

"I have no idea." Vorador threw his hands in the air. "If you had heeded sane council and chosen apartments on the interior of the manor, rather than this drafty old store room, he would have had a harder time getting to you."

"If Raziel wasn't a damn insomniac, he would have succeeded." Kain grimaced, swooping down on the broken lantern to investigate it closer. The sickeningly sweet smell still clung to the oil within. "What is this crap, and where did an idiot like Faustus come by it?"

The green furred vampire took the odd device, noting the odor with a grimace. "I've smelled this before, a long time ago. At the dawn of the first crusade, I think."

"Helena's Marigold." Janos confirmed cryptically. "Or rather the essential oil from it. In ages past it was harvested by vampires as a remedy of sorts, a balm for the sick. But the Hylden learned to refine the process and create a distilled ester that was ten times as potent."

"What is its purpose?" Kain frowned. "I know of no poison for vampires, and yet, this one clearly had an effect."

"Peaceful sleep." Janos stroked Raziel's hair. "In small doses it allowed healers to lull the sick into a restful oblivion for a time. However in larger doses, it eventually suppresses life altogether. One under its influence would be slower, calmer, or simply comatose."

"Hence why I didn't awake until almost too late." He retrieved the lamp from Vorador to look at it with new respect. "Remarkable. But if it has not existed for several centuries, how has it come to be here?"

"Someone must have rediscovered the formula." Vorador rumbled thoughtfully. "If the Saraphan could decipher it from old Hylden records, someone else could have certainly decoded it from theirs. Or perhaps someone was in contact with the Hylden directly. It's not impossible. The flower itself is common enough in the highlands."

The green vampire snarled in sudden annoyance. "How many other 'forgotten' weapons will we stumble over, I wonder, in this idiotic war?" Turning to Kain he pointed angrily. "And you! Why didn't you foresee this? Aren't you supposed to be our oracle? How is it you of all people were taken unawares? Good god what would have happened if you had died? The Pillars would have fallen again!"

"Inconclusive." Kain countered seething at the implied negligence. "For all we know they'd have chosen nine new guardians and gotten on with their existence quite happily. As for the rest, I am not infallible, you old fool. The fact that I can predict these things at all is a bloody miracle which you ought to be grateful for! No. I didn't see this particular attack coming! I didn't foresee that useless trio of fools out living their Saraphan allies, truth-be-told!"

Tossing the lamp into the corner of his room in irritation, Kain paced to vent his need to crush something. "I didn't know they would actually manage to piece together a plot that would come close to touching me! And I certainly didn't expect a damnably unlucky _child_ to attempt to thwart such an attack single-handed! So you can damn well accept my apology for not being bloody omnipotent!"

He pressed his fists against his forehead, claw on horn, forcing the rage back, saving it for when it could be better applied. Vorador did him the honor of holding his tongue for several minutes, perhaps aware of how close he was to getting a closer look at the Soul Reaver's edge than he might wish. Even Janos seemed to be holding his breath, awaiting a pause in the argument.

"Kain," The ancient tentatively broke the prolonged silence.

"Yes?" He drew a breath to steady himself, feeling a fool for letting emotion get the better of him after so many years of self-control.

"I believe Raziel is able to be safely moved now, and would probably do better in a bed for the near future. Given rest and quiet, he may very well wake tonight, tomorrow at the latest."

"Thank you. Janos." Kain relaxed his clenched fingers and turned around to examine the blue vampire's handiwork. Raziel looked pale where not bloodstained, but generally whole. A nasty mess of a scar made a livid pattern across his mid-drift. He snarled in anger at the lingering reminder. Faustus would pay dearly for his impudence. He would make sure of it. Raziel nearly dead before he began had not been part of his plan.

He knelt in the congealing mess, torn between taking charge of his wounded offspring and hunting down Faustus like the animal he was. The vicious urge was not reasonable. In all likelihood the sprinter was half a league away by now, off to sulk somewhere not easily found. To hunt him would be to waste precious time, and probably expose himself to any other nasty traps that Sebastian had concocted along the way. He was not the flash-point tempered fool of his youth. It was time to act like it.

"Is the grey room still free at the end of the hall?" Kain gathered up the limp body of his fledgling from the floor, feeling the sticky texture of drying blood on his arms. "It had a built-in tub, as I recall."

Vorador scratched his neck thoughtfully. "I can't honestly remember. But if someone is there, we can easily move them." Clearly feeling conciliatory, the vampire held the door open to assist with the transfer. "It has a sitting room as well, if you're thinking of a semi-permanent relocation."

"At least until we pull up the floor in here. I doubt this stain can be sanded out." Kain looked around at the general havoc Faustus had wrought; promising himself that he would come back and collect those few things that mattered later, after Raziel was settled properly. "We can deal with it in a few hours. For now just nail the shutters shut and lock the door."

"Aye. I'll set some children to it later tonight." Vorador lead the way past the sleeping fledglings in the hall and out into the main corridor of the building. Around a corner and tucked into an alcove was another gilt door. The old vampire went in ahead to light the candles.

"Perfect, it is untenanted. And the cistern is full, if you don't mind chilled milk? I can drag up some decanters if oil would be easier for you, or better yet, you can wait a few hours and I'll send up a woman to assist you."

"I'll manage with what's there." Kain murmured, rage slowly returning the longer he had to think about events.

Sensing that he was meant to depart, Vorador hesitated at the door. "I'm just going to go assist Janos with… well, I'll have someone bring up a change of clothes for the child later this evening, if that's soon enough?"

"That will be fine."

"You'll call if there's anything urgent in the meantime?" The green vampire looked around for anything else that needed tending.

"Vorador. Send out a hunting party when the children wake up." He formed the words slowly and carefully. Not wanting to alarm the vampire with a second explosion in so many minutes. "I don't expect them to find the bastard. But I'd like to know where he came from, and where he ran to, if at all possible."

"Yes, of course."

"Of course, if he should be foolish enough to let himself get caught…"

"I'll see that they understand the seriousness of his actions."

"That will be all, old friend." Kain murmured, not taking his eyes off of the fledgling still asleep in his arms.

He waited until he was alone before looking up, assessing the new set of rooms for items to solve his immediate needs. His memory hadn't served him false. A tiled alcove in the bedroom sported a sizeable claw-footed tub of gothic design. The polished pewter glowed with reflected candlelight. Attached to the tub through a clever network of pipes, was a large tank in the room above, filled by some long suffering member of the household with liquid appropriate for bathing in. Apparently the room had been prepared for someone in the near future, as milk was a desirable commodity, but tended to spoil quickly if unused.

He peered over the lip of the tub to make sure that the drain was stoppered and then gently lowered the comatose fledgling in. Actually looking at the vampire's clothing for the first time, Kain found Raziel was dressed in his regular trousers and cuffed shirt as opposed to the loose tunic he wore when sleeping. Kain pondered the mystery as he pried the blood stiffened cloth off of the vampire. Either the child had been roving in his usual manner and observed Faustus on the grounds, or had been otherwise taken by surprise. His own clothing amounted to little other than the pair of pants he had fallen into bed with. Neither of them would have a stitch worth salvaging by nightfall it seemed. His clothes were stained with Raziel's blood from knee to cuff. Raziel's shirt was shredded to almost rags thanks to his encounter with Faustus.

The various unsalvageable bits of fabric were easily collected in a bucket meant for the hearth. Kain unapologetically tore out some clean rags from the remains of his clothes to act as crude washcloths. There was no sense spoiling Vorador's toweling needlessly. He pulled the chain to open the sluice above and used the initial torrent released to scrub off his arms and shins while waiting for the tub to fill a little. The fluid rapidly turning pink as it spilled over Raziel's limp body.

Finishing with his own rough scrub down, Kain proceeded far more gently with his second chore. Even working quickly, he felt Raziel begin to shiver from the prolonged soak. Draining the fouled bath, he let the tub fill again to rinse off what was left and then hauled the vampire out to towel him dry. Finally clean, Raziel was tucked into the large bed, and Kain was left little to do but watch him sleep.

It didn't make for a pleasant vigil. Images of what had very nearly come to pass danced in his head. The look on Raziel's face as he held a loft the living Reaver had nearly stopped him cold. If the blade had consumed him, then it would have all been over. No Raziel to become a vampire lord in this timeline, meant no Raziel to be drawn back in to the past. No Raziel to aid him against the Dark Entity. No Raziel to unravel the mystery of Moebius' paradox. No Raziel meant no heart to call his own. Kain grimaced, rubbing his chest beneath the old scar. That heart had gotten quite a workout since his awakening.

He hadn't experienced such an unpleasant shock in over a century. Not really since he had restored Nosgoth. If surprises like this were his reward for not murdering Sebastian and his lot when given the chance, he had to concede Vorador was right. He had been a short-sighted fool, and now had to reap the ill harvest sown. Kain reached out and combed a claw through Raziel's damp hair. "I think you've proven your greatness with remarkable flair today, child." The vampire shifted slightly in his sleep, too exhausted to do more. He repeated the gesture, marveling at how horrifyingly human, and frail, the fledgling looked. "Not that I had any doubt, of course."

Lingering adrenaline would not allow him to curl up next to Raziel as he half wished to. Not even his favorite lieutenant could calm his itch to strangle Faustus until dead. Kain stood, wrapping a stained towel around himself out of consideration for any early rising vampires patrolling the mansion, and set off for his rooms. With any luck he could salvage what few possessions he had before Vorador's mob of children descended to investigate and gossip over the ruins.

*****


	15. Chapter 15

**Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King**

AU/continuation- fic of Defiance

The Beginning – Chapter 6

8 8 8 8 8

K A I N

"Look at this, Kain!" Vorador's excited murmur made him glance up from his book to see what was so interesting. The green vampire had stopped in earlier in the evening, trailed by five curious fledglings, to let him know that everything was being tended to without hitch. After shooing the group out, Kain had been left in blissful silence for the rest of the night; opting to read a well-remembered farce of a novel as he sat vigil next to his recovering offspring rather than attempt to concentrate on anything prone to renew his temper. Raziel rested uneventfully despite the occasional visitor. Even Vorador's energetic entrance did not seem to alarm the sleeper. Kain rose to see what it was the green vampire held aloft with delicate claws. It looked, and smelled, like a grizzly trophy.

He made a face. "If you've come to return some portion of my child's anatomy that Faustus vivisected, I'll thank you to dispose of it properly."

"Don't be crass, Kain." The old vampire snorted. "This foul smelling bit of meat has nothing to do with your fledgling, as far as we know, although I'd sorely love to ask the boy about it. This bit of excrement, seemingly, was once attached to Faustus."

"How is this?" Kain claimed the nondescript portion of flesh and studied it, trying to figure out what exactly it had once been.

"If I had to guess, I'd say the fight wasn't entirely one-sided." Vorador also peered down at the mysterious clod of meat. "It would explain the blood trail that Umah has reported back on. She followed it for more than two miles before it faded. They're still tracking the scent trail from there."

Wiping away some of the gummed blood, Kain hissed in amazement. The mauled little bit of flesh had an iris embedded in it. "I'll be damned."

"…Got the bastard's eye." A hoarse whisper from the vicinity of the bed grabbed their attention immediately. Raziel was awake, weakly trying to detangle himself from the array of blankets he was under.

Kain swept over to the bed, leaving the ugly prize in Vorador's keeping. Assisting the fledgling as gently as he could, he got Raziel oriented vaguely upright and then checked him for signs of renewed injuries. Thankfully the vampire seemed no worse for his sudden return to wakefulness. Sore and angry, Raziel gingerly touched his stomach and winced.

"You'll need a day yet, before Janos will let you up and about as usual." Kain spoke softly, relieved beyond the ability to express. "The scar will likely fade before the end of the year, at worst it will be gone with your first evolution."

"You wouldn't wake." Raziel looked at him dismay, voice growing steadier with each word. "I tried to rouse you, but you wouldn't wake."

"I know." Kain decided to save explanations of the drug for later. As befuddled as his wounded offspring was, he didn't want to complicate matters needlessly. Already pale, the fledgling still had an almost bloodless look about him as he recovered, his eyes had bruised looking shadows beneath them. Kain ran the back of a claw along the young vampire's arm in a soothing gesture. "How is it that you came to be in my room of all places? The coincidence seems a trifle strained."

"I think I must have heard the window break." Raziel smiled wanly at his previous foolishness. "It woke me, and I thought I might as well go to the library… but I was curious as to where you were and so thought to go to your room... Then I saw Faustus, and knew there was ill afoot."

"…Curiosity killed the cat." Vorador completed the homily in a de sotto voice. Kain shot him a warning look.

Turning back to his favorite, he gave the fledgling's shoulder an encouraging shake. "Did he say anything worthwhile?"

"He introduced himself." Raziel made a disgusted face. "Talked a lot of nonsense about how he was wronged. Threatened to kill you. I grabbed for the Reaver and…" The vampire closed his eyes, fighting the memory. When he opened them again, his look was haunted. "I didn't know it was alive! You told us never to touch it, but I didn't understand why! Even Faustus was terrified. He fled as soon as it screamed…"

Twisting his hands through his hair as if still able to hear the sword, Raziel shuddered. "I felt so cold. So very cold. And the sound it made… horrible! Like the death knell of some deranged demon… How is it you can wield such a power? I cannot fathom it. I thought I might go mad."

"Normally the sword isn't quite so… loud, to me. It despises all others however and will not bear their touch without a struggle." Kain stroked the vampire's messy hair, trying to soothe away the memory. It seemed best to distract the fledgling before he became too curious about the blade. While there seemed to be no lasting harm to either of the two Raziels, he didn't want to ever consider another chance-meeting of the two. "How is it you came by Faustus' eye?"

"He was trying to snap my neck." Raziel hissed weakly. "I thought, if I was going to die, at least I could return him some portion of the same humiliation." Holding up his hand, he inspected his fledgling claws. "Would that I had weapons like yours, the traitor would be dead even now."

"Someday you will." Kain stood and slowly pressed the vampire back down onto the mattress. "I owe you a debt for your service to me, child. Do not suppose I will forget it. Now, rest. I'll return in a moment."

Vorador gave him an eloquent look and followed him into the corridor, hiding his toothy grin until after the door was closed. "Tore the bloody thing right out of the bastard's head? I take back everything slighting I ever said towards your eldest, Kain. He may act the docile child, but there's a devil in him! In a decade's time I would not want to get on his bad side for the world."

It was no use trying to contain his pride to a mere smirk. Kain shook his head in quiet disbelief and pleasure. Vorador was right. Raziel's trophy was remarkable when taking his age and inexperience into account. To be fair, Faustus was a damned idiot. But even so, he would be stinging far longer than the fledgling in the aftermath of the fight. Kain had seen how long a vampire's eyes took to regenerate before, and it was no risk to assume his former lieutenant would be wearing a patch for years to come. A failure and a cripple, the fool would not soon forget it.

He almost wished he could be there to see it. Sebastian's expression would be delicious, he had no doubt. Would he be furious? Or simply resigned as he listened to his brother tell the sordid story of how he not only failed to kill Kain, but was defeated utterly by a mere ankle-biter? How satisfying it would be to watch the arrogant back-stabber whimpering and weeping blood. Maybe Sebastian would do them all a favor and kill Faustus in a fit of pique.

"Were his injuries less, I would order a toast in Raziel's honor," Vorador mused. "Ah well, it can wait until later. Shall I tell his siblings of his triumph, or would you like to do the honors?"

"I don't think an official announcement will be necessary. No doubt the gossip chain has already circulated the first half of the tale. You might as well spread the revised version and get a jump on the speculation."

The green vampire continued to stare in amazement at the lump of membrane he had found. "Remarkable, Kain. Simply remarkable." At length he produced a handkerchief, wrapping up the foul bit of flesh and tucking it within his doublet, no doubt to act as aid to his later storytelling. Given how little Vorador cared for the fleet-footed rogue, Kain half wondered if he would keep the relic permanently by means of some enchanted locket or the like. The old vampire had far worse trophies in his possession. Vorador patted the hidden pocket of his ornate coat paternally as he seemed to have the exact same thought.

"I'll have one of my women bring up some food for the boy. And a book, or he's liable to be bored enough to want to get up and go roving again." Bowing slightly he turned to go, taking his air of jovial merriment at Faustus' suffering with him.

Kain shook his head in amusement at his old friend's antics. Undoubtedly Janos would be a wet-blanket about the whole affair, wishing to restore the wayward sheep unto the flock. As far as he cared, Umah could suck the marrow from the fool's bones and bring back his severed head to be reunited with his lost eye. It'd make a pretty enough decoration for the front gates. Sadly he had little expectation of even Umah being able to apprehend the traitor without difficulty. Life seldom granted him such convenient turns of fate.

"Have your wives add a goblet for me as well." Kain called after the retreating noble's back, trusting Vorador's oversized ears to catch the request. The green vampire waved a hand in acknowledgment as he made his exit.

8 8 8 8 8

Kain didn't recognize the woman who brought the food up. Hardly surprising the way Vorador and his wives had been widening their little clan by the dozen nearly every week. The girl looked little more than a fledgling herself, and wasn't above peering curiously over at the bed where his lieutenant napped. He shooed her out before she could fumble anything or otherwise make a stir, loading her down with soiled rags as she left. Taking a long draw off the first chalice did wonders in soothing the last of his upset. Kain swirled the remaining blood in the cup and looked speculatively over at his offspring.

Compared to the afternoon, Raziel already looked much recovered from his ordeal. But a stronger drink might go a long ways towards ensuring the fledgling suffered no ill effects in the long term. Setting the cup down on the sideboard, Kain dragged a claw down the center of his hand, forcing his own blood to flow and mix with the supply already within the goblet. The wound closed as soon as he let go, leaving no evidence of where it had been. Inspecting the cup a second time, he swirled it a little, mixing the contents together into an innocent looking portion.

Undoubtedly the fledgling would taste the added potency. But tired as he was, the lieutenant probably wouldn't question it. More importantly, he wouldn't remember to remark upon it, should the others ask. Giving Raziel an edge was all well and good. He didn't expect it to go to the fledgling's head. Giving the rest of his brood the impression that they could score 'seconds' off of him was simply out of the question; he'd never hear the end of the nagging.

"Wake up." Kain nudged his favorite.

The dark haired vampire responded to the command immediately, blinking as if surprised at his own sudden transition from asleep to alert. "Lord?"

"There is drink, if you feel able."

"You do not need to nurse me, Scion." Raziel winced as he sat up. "I know your time is valuable."

"So are you." Kain sighed, feeling old. It took a moment for his favorite to coordinate himself enough to accept the offered goblet. As eager as he was to be self-sufficient, his hands shook visibly as he latched onto the vessel. Kain kept a steadying hold on it until he was sure it wouldn't tip. "Drink, vampire. Drink and grow strong."

Carefully wrapping both hands around the cup, the fledgling did as he was bid. Raziel frowned at the first sip, but drank the rest readily enough.

"There was medicine in it?" He stared down into the empty goblet. "It did not taste like usual."

"Yes. There was medicine, of a sort. What did it taste like?" Kain couldn't help being mildly curious. Whatever effect his blood might have on others, he himself was generally immune to it.

Raziel tilted his head, considering the question. "It felt… warm. Almost burning. I feel it still." Rubbing his throat, the vampire tried to puzzle it out. "Not a bad feeling."

"Try to pay it no mind. It will pass soon enough." Kain claimed the empty goblet and polished off the other before setting both by the door. Turning back he found his lieutenant looking around the room alertly before the man's eyes fastened on the small stack of literature Vorador had supplied.

"My book!" Raziel pulled the top most tome off the stack and opened it, pleased.

"What does he have you reading now? Still Meridian?" He tilted the cover to look even as the fledgling flipped through it.

"A biography of the Time Guardian Moebius." Raziel made a face. "Not terribly good. Almost certainly penned, or at least approved of, by the man himself. If even half of his heroic feats written here are unembellished, I'd be shocked out of all reason."

Kain was quietly appalled. "Vorador has set you to learning about Moebius through his own words?"

"He said it was never too soon to learn the nature of our enemies." The dark haired vampire replied, either unconcerned or unawares of his sire's displeasure. "From what I've seen so far, this Moebius was quite the self-aggrandizer. Did you know that even though he spoke publicly before the first crusade about attempting to find a peace between peoples, he was funneling hundreds of thousands of gold marks into the creation of his own private militant-holy order? That the Saraphan, whom he claimed were a joint effort by all the Circle, were probably mostly his idea all along? He brags about it here! Lying bastard."

"Yes, I have heard that before." Kain sat down, feeling rather stunned. It was hard at times, to come to terms with the idea of speaking about Moebius in the past tense. Even after hundreds of years, he still expected the slippery time streamer to pop up unexpectedly.

All but one of the former guardian's nefarious machines were destroyed. He'd made sure of that. The last one, he had thought about a long time before leaving it in place. As a precaution however, he had barred and chained the door to the chamber before any vampire had moved into the keep. A small mountain of junk disguised the entrance to Moebius' private sanctum, and the entire level of the citadel was so flood prone anyway, that it was rare that a vampire bothered with it at all. In theory, the chamber would rest neglected and forgotten for the next several hundred years without mishap. It would have been a lie however, to say that he slept entirely easy some nights, knowing it was still there.

Kain wanted with all his heart to reduce it to rubble, but it was still needed. In order for the past to be true, there was one final transit through time that had to be undertaken. The last time streaming chamber of Nosgoth still had a job to do. He shook his head at the irony of it all. He had flipped his coin, and had seen it land. To change his mind now would upset the whole of the carefully ordered pattern he had set into place on that terrible day when the world ended. He shook his head, not wanting to brood about events so far yet in the future. Raziel was alive in the here-and-now, he sighed. Might as well enjoy the boy's company while he could. Kain reached out and took the book from his fledgling, replacing it with the novel he had been reading earlier.

"If you're feeling energetic enough to read through Moebius' doggerel, you can read this instead." He moved over to the window, feeling depression settle in his chest. Not even the radiant twinkle of the Pillars over the edge of the mountain, could quite give him hope. "Read it aloud, child. If you want to be of use."

Raziel flipped the small book over in his hands, admiring the bindings and leatherwork. "A comedy? I didn't know you cared for such things."

"Even I can use a laugh, now and again, Raziel." Kain smirked, leaning against the glass. "Read for me?"

Shrugging at the unlikely command, the vampire opened to the first page, his voice naturally falling into the rhyming cant of the old verse as he began to recite. Knowing the story as well as anyone could, Kain readily ignored the actual events of the chapter, enjoying instead the smooth sound of Raziel's words.

8 8 8 8 8

R A Z I E L

It was a genuine relief to learn that there was finally something more gossip worthy happening within the walls of the manor than his own months-old folly. Turel snorted at his audible sigh of pleasure as he sat sprawled in the chair across from him. His brother was still dressed for sparing practice, sturdy leathers making him look the part of a seasoned soldier despite their shared youth. Raziel stretched his arms over his head, enjoying the opportunity to relax for a few minutes and not be harassed by any number of well wishing busybodies among Vorador's household.

"Don't know what you're so happy about." The tall man shrugged. "It sounds like a heap of fuss and bother if you ask me. I don't see why we should need move at all. The swamp has hunting enough for all of us. And it'll be a full week's journey by night to reach the citadel if we're obliged to keep pace with women and weaklings."

Raziel raised an eyebrow at his brother's candor, knowing full well he was probably still counted amongst that less-than-elite group thanks to his injury. Well enough that he could return to lessons, and even resume fencing to a degree, he'd been flatly forbidden from anything too rough for the remainder of the month out of consideration of his knitting muscles. Janos' strictures struck him as particularly paranoid. He _felt_ fine. Only the occasional sensation of stiffness lingered to remind him of his stupidity.

"Maybe our sire feels that we are ready for a more… worldly approach to living." He pointed out idly, rather than throwing one of the couch cushions at his nearest sibling in revenge for the slight. "Vorador lives a retired lifestyle here. We can hardly adapt ourselves to the nature of the coming conflict if we train in isolation from the army already gathered. I find I am quite curious to see what lies beyond the trees. I've heard there are several human settlements near the fortress, for example."

"I hate when you talk like that." Turel folded his arms across his chest with a sigh of annoyance.

"Like what?" Raziel frowned.

His brother reached out a booted foot and kicked him lightly. "Like a god damned politician. Knock it off, it's unnerving how good you are at it."

"My apologies, Turel." He grinned, "I shall speak plainly then. I find Vorador's manor is comfortable, but incredibly boring – Faustus' attempted murder aside. Why should we not have an adventure? I'm living proof that even infants like us can survive a beating with no real harm done. So why worry about what lies in store for us?"

"Point." His brother pushed his hair back from his face and sighed again in annoyance. "We're going to have to play nursemaids to the others you realize, Kain will undoubtedly be too busy with his own business to see to us personally. What will you wager me that Zephon attempts to tip Melchiah into the first river we cross?"

"If he so much as tries it I'll dangle his feet in until they melt clean off." Raziel agreed grimly. "His sense of humor is not always as funny as he thinks."

"Is it ever?" Turel snorted. Turning to look out into the night, he kept a weather-eye on their younger siblings still jabbing at one another down in the courtyard.

Torchlight revealed that it was three on one, with Dumah playing at straw-man for the others to hack at. The instructor who was supposed to mid them at their efforts was off to one side, half in shadow as he spoke privately with one of Vorador's pretty wives. Not even vampires it seemed were immune to the urges that came along in the springtime. The man had no eyes for anything but his companion as they laughed over some private joke.

Luckily, the large vampire was more than up to the task of fencing solo against the mob, deflecting his siblings while taunting them to do better. Raziel moved to the window to watch as well, just in time to see a rare moment of cooperation between Rahab and his younger siblings as two feinted and the other lunged so as to trick Dumah into leaving an opening. His resulting shout of annoyance made them smile.

"Suppose we should do a bit of nursemaid-ing now." Turel suggested philosophically. "The instructor looks as though he's got other things on his mind."

Raziel nodded in agreement, holding the door for his sibling. "That's one thing to look forward to, at any rate." He shrugged. "Once we're joined with the army, there'll be no shortage of people we can foist Dumah off on?"

"Now there is a happy thought." His brother laughed shortly.

8 8 8 8 8

The rumored horses never materialized, but two weeks found them all on the road regardless. Wrapped in stiff all-weather cloaks and high boots to protect against mud and creek-beds, a group of thirty vampires made its way through the swamps and across country to the highway. Raziel couldn't help but stare at the scenery; so different from the looming shadows he had lived within for the first year of his life. Despite the safety and comforts of Vorador's mansion, part of him was deeply glad to leave the misty dank landscape behind.

The voice in the darkness had never hailed him a second time. Still he could not quite shake the memory of it. Whether it had been dream, or reality, it bothered him to think of it. Between the haunting nature of the swamp, and the proven vulnerability of the manor itself, he was ready for a change.

Pulling his cloak tighter about his shoulders he breathed in the fresh mountain air as they crossed between the rolling foothills to the west and down into a wide valley dotted with farmlands and townships. In the distance, a white gleam stood straight and clean as a line between heaven and earth, catching the moonlight with rigid beauty. Even Dumah, the least romantic by far of them, was compelled to glance towards the Pillars of Nosgoth. Their very existence was improbably beautiful.

The road would fork eventually, Raziel knew from studying the maps. One could get to the stronghold either overland to their destination, or by following the highway past the very foot of the magic artifact from ancient times. A _vampire_ artifact, he reminded himself, feeling proud of his race's former accomplishments. Sadly the highway would also take them through a series of towns not yet entirely friendly for vampires. It was deemed far too dangerous for fledglings such as them. With such a large group on the move, discretion was the better option he resigned himself.

There were enough entertainments to be had simply in the hike, and the camping, without having to see all of Nosgoth all at once. Watching his hungrier brothers accepting their ration of blood for the night with sighs of their own, he grinned into his cup. The false light of pre-dawn let him read Turel's exasperation at their paltry measure perfectly. To be fair, there was more of Turel to feed. Dumah grumbled far less discretely, downing his dinner in two gulps before shaking the empty cup over his mouth in a vain attempt to get the last scattering of drops.

"I can _smell_ them out there." He rubbed his jaw in annoyance as he cast the empty vessel aside. "Surely one or two wouldn't be missed. Are we not lords of all dominion? Why should we not hunt when we hunger! This is pathetic…"

"Oh for god's sake… Shut up, Dumah." Rahab didn't bother to mince words for his thickheaded brother. Turel merely reached sideways to cuff the man into silence. Three days of the same complaint dusk and dawn, had allowed all of them plenty of time to reach their own conclusions as to why they moved in secret and not as an ostentatious war party.

"Janos says that self-restraint is vital to-"

"Nobody cares what Janos says!" Dumah snarled over Melchiah's observation, rising to his feet he snatched his youngest brother's cup up, only to snarl again when he realized it too was empty. Raziel downed the last of his before the larger fledgling could get any clever ideas about claiming it. Zephon was only a step behind, gulping his just as his cup was stolen. The pair hissed at eachother in annoyance before Dumah contented himself with pacing instead. Even he knew that starting a brawl with one would undoubtedly mean brawling with all. And the other vampires in the camp could hardly let them raise such an uproar without interfering as well.

"I'm _hungry_." Turning to Raziel he raised his hands in vague supplication. "Those cold-bitches Vorador sent to escort us like _you_, brother. You go ask them for more food…"

"Go to sleep, brother." He advised quellingly. "You're acting like an infant who squalls for want of more milk. We are a large group, and we have days yet before we get to the Sanctuary. If there was more to give, they would give it."

"Boot licker." Dumah sneered in reply, but did as he was told. Well used to his insults, Raziel simply shook his head in amusement. The others watched the surly fledgling retreat to one of the two tents provided to them with expressions ranging from annoyance to boredom.

Turel rubbed his head and looked towards the east to gage the sun. The gesture had become instinctive for all of them, even after only days spent in the outside world. A vampire marked time by the hue of the sky when in the wilds. Better to err on the side of caution and retire to camp early, then be caught out come daybreak. Their capes were dense enough that they had the luxury of time if they were caught, but the risk became astronomically higher. An older vampire could expose a sliver of skin by mistake and receive a nasty burn. A young one might simply combust all together.

The sky was noticeably brighter. The first horizontal shafts of daylight through the clouds added traces of color to the grey blue sky. The upper portion of the Pillars seemed to glow with white fire. Raziel wondered at how beautiful they would be in full daylight. Sadly to witness the splendor, he'd be obliged to don a ridiculous number of protective garments or risk certain oblivion. Someday, he promised himself, perhaps after an evolution or two. He would find some shady grotto near the edifice and see for himself what the sunlit world had to show him.

"Well, I'm done." Ever the most practical of them, Turel stood and dusted off his pants. Offering a half smile towards Raziel, he jerked his chin towards the tents. "Given the surly-bear's mood towards you at the moment, I take it I'll be with him today?" Glancing around at the others he pointed to Melchiah. "You too, schoolboy. Come on." Steering the smaller fledgling by a firm grip on his collar, he retreated to the tent Dumah had chosen for the day.

"Guess that means we're all to share the other." Zephon smiled with mocking sweetness at Rahab. "I could not imagine a more lovely time than to cuddle close with you until dusk, dear brother."

The vampire didn't even bother to look up from his book. Striking blindly but with uncanny accuracy, he flicked his forefinger against his younger sibling's ear with a painful sounding snap. "Knock it off, Zephon."

"Be nice, Rahab." Raziel scolded gently. "He's just being… Zephon. He doesn't mean anything by it."

"At least you two don't snore. I'll share with you over being sandwiched in with that pair of oxen any day." The youngest of them agreed in a far less oily tone. He even helped collect the cups as Raziel stood to take care of the necessary chore. Rahab closed his book with a sigh and did his part to tidy up their corner of the camp before making good his retreat.

Raziel was not surprised in the least to find that the pair of siblings were positioned on precisely opposite sides of the tent when he finally climbed in. Those scouts that were trained for daytime survival had donned their final layers of leather and cloth to weather the uncomfortable hours between dawn and dusk. The rest of the camp was still and silent as the majority of its occupants gave over to sleep. He took the place obviously left for him, wrapping his blanket around his shoulders and settling in between the other two with a sigh for their stubborn animosity.

Rahab and Zephon were as much an oil-and-water pairing as Rahab and Dumah were. The 'middle child' of their company lacking both the physical prowess necessary to ingratiate himself with the one, and the cynical merriment of the other. It wasn't that Rahab was dull or weak, Raziel supposed, he just seemed to prefer his own company to other peoples. Perhaps it was the general challenge of gaining his bookish-brother's attention that made him want to try at all. Maybe it was just that his brother reminded him a little of Kain in that sense. "Sleep well, Rahab." He offered. Looking to his other side where Zephon had cocooned himself for the day he snorted in amusement. "Sleep well, Zephon."

"And you, brother." Rahab proved he was not yet asleep with his soft answer, shifting a little to find a more comfortable position against the ground.

"Good sleep, mum and dad." Their other brother joked beneath his blanket in a faked village-idiot voice. "I'll leave it to the pair of you to decide which is which…"

Raziel covered his face with his hand to keep from laughing at Rahab's exasperated sigh of annoyance.

"I'll kill him." The fledgling to his left muttered under his breath. "Mark me, brother, one of these days, I'm strangling the little leach in his sleep."

"Not tonight." He advised, composing himself to at least pretend to rest. Between the constant walking, and the clean air, he'd had far less trouble with staying asleep during daylight than usual. It was for the best, as the tent was a rather compressed space to be obliged to sit in for hours if he was struck with a bout of wakefulness. He could always borrow Rahab's book to while away the time, he supposed. The soft rhythm of one brother's breathing was soon mirrored by the other. Letting the pair lull him as well, he closed his eyes and let his consciousness drift to the sound of morning birdsong.

8 8 8 8 8

Not only was their new home in a far more agreeable landscape. But even better to Raziel's mind, was that it was deemed a far safer territory. Hundreds of vampire soldiers gathered in a single fortress meant that patrols and borders could be maintained at a distance of several miles, leaving the woods and canyons surrounding the wide lake open to even a young vampire's exploration. His brothers had quickly learned - or was it re-learned? - the art of horseman-ship with those steady beasts allotted to the general use in the stables. Within weeks they had begun to explore the shore lines of the lake for as far as could be safely navigated, as well as the winding roads and paths through the valley around their new home. Within the first year, the territory had become as familiar as the halls and rooms of the fortress itself. No one looked unnerved when one or more of them opted to set out on their own for an evening anymore.

As their skills increased their outings were sometimes formalized into actual hunts for boars and even men. Mastering the ability to navigate in the woodlands in all seasons, they still managed to have a bit of entertainment despite the endless lessons and preparations they were obliged to endure. Especially during those months when Kain was away, there was always the opportunity for wandering with no set agenda. Raziel secretly preferred it that way. Being able to roam as he wished in the trees was a rare bit of freedom from routine. He made no pretense about his desire to slip out beyond the old fortress' walls whether alone or with others whenever the chance arose.

The strong moonlight of late summer allowed his mount to see where it was going at night without undue nervousness. Raziel nudged the animal's ribs with his boot every few minutes to keep it moving at its lazy pace, but otherwise didn't hurry it. Turel and several of Vorador's women were out and about as well, but they'd drifted apart once they'd hit the road. His brother was inclined to more active pursuits, interested in practicing his archery on the night-prowling beasts of the valley along with the company of fearsome amazons.

Raziel left his sibling to it, knowing that it was not only boar that his brother had his eye on. The lissome blonde hunt-master had a certain feral charisma to her that even he'd noticed over the past several days. Not enough to tempt him into making a pass at her, but still, he could see her appeal. Leaving Turel some privacy in which to clumsily court the vampiress, he chose instead to guide his horse towards the meadows on the other side of the lake.

There, farmland butted up against the woods. Human villages surrounded by their sturdy stockades of thick timber managed to make a reasonable living despite their proximity to the vampire lands. The elder vampires' general edict against unnecessary killing had held firm even when the trio of ancients were preoccupied elsewhere. The humans lived mostly unmolested, and even profited by their relations with the fortress, although he couldn't blame them for being rather nervous about their neighbors after dark. By day they drove cartloads of wheat, textiles, ores and other sale worthy goods to the vampire sanctuary for exchange for the luxury of silver coins from the southlands, which the vampires had in abundance. By night, the majority of the humans hid behind their stockades, confident that unless provoked, that their trading partners would not eat them and thus lose out on the convenience of having their necessities delivered to their door.

Woe however to anyone caught in the woods after sunset however, especially if the weather was as fine as it was tonight. Even a friend might be mistaken for food in the heat of the moment. The local villages had developed their own means of punishment for lawbreakers over the years. Anyone they didn't like, they simply had to push outside of the stockade. Eventually the problem would take care of itself one way or another. Bandits didn't tend to last very long in the valley. The smart ones fled south or west to one of the human cities.

Raziel sniffed the air, catching a distant whiff of humans, and horses, in the distance ahead. Curious enough about the smell that he felt inclined to investigate, he clucked at his mount to goad it to be more active. Not equipped for heavy skirmishing, he still had both knife and sword on him. Unless it was a large group of mischief-makers, the advantage would be his in whatever encounter lay ahead. At worst he could call for Turel, he supposed. A chance for a real hunt with armed quarry would undoubtedly entertain his sibling, and give him ample opportunity to impress the lady he admired with his prowess.

With the long shadows it became safer to just lead his horse rather than try to ride it. He picked his way along the narrow path through the trees, mindful of any sharp rocks or sudden pitfalls that might cause the animal to stumble or injure itself. Eventually his dogleg led him back to a larger, more manageable strip of road. The hard-packed dirt showed layers of wagon-ruts in it, hinting at frequent traffic.

Raziel guessed that it was the eastern track back to the fortress, which gave him his bearings as to the nearest villages. The scent of humans was hanging vaguely in the air, leading him to believe that they'd already come and gone, whoever they were. Judging by the heavier scent of horse-sweat he supposed they'd left in a hurry. Not exactly an unusual phenomenon for so late at night. Listening carefully, he sought any lingering souls he might question, but instead of nervous breathing or other sounds of an ambush, he frowned at the out of place sound of a woman's muffled weeping.

"Hello?" He asked foolishly, seeking to narrow down where the human was hiding. Tying his mount to a bush, he let it forage amongst the tufts of grass on the side of the road while he stepped through the brambles to see what he could find on the other side. Over a hummock and around a monster of an old tree stump, he paused to listen again. "Is someone there? Do not be frightened."

Predictably, rather than showing herself, the woman suddenly gasped and fell silent. Raziel sighed in annoyance. If only he was older, he supposed he might find her by the sound of her heartbeat. Still. The human could only hold her breath for so long. With her next exhale he had her pinpointed in the shadowy niche beneath the dead tree's roots. The space was impossibly small, he decided as he crouched down infront of it to get a better look. A guilty shuffle at the back of the burrow revealed a tattered skirt, and a pair of bare feet.

Raziel sat on his heels and tried his best to look non-threatening. The human couldn't be more than a girl to fit in such a space. "Come along now. I won't hurt you. What on earth are you doing in there the first place. It's not safe to be out on such a night. Have you no home to go to?"

"You're a vampire." The girl squeaked in quiet horror. "Please don't eat me. I won't taste good at all. I've been blessed in the river just this past week!"

Smiling at humanity's obsession with their rituals and superstitions, he shook his head. "That just means you'll be cleaner tasting, little one. You'd be better off rubbing yourself in onions if you were trying to discourage one of us from finding you. Although if hungry enough, that wouldn't really help either."

Hearing her panicked whimper he shook his head at his foolishness for not helping with her fears. "You're from one of the villages by the lake, yes?"

"Y-yes." She peered out at him with a look of surprise. "You know of us? I thought I was miles away…"

"What's your name?" He asked gently. Reminded of how close he was, the girl got a good look at him and spooked again, ducking back into her hideyhole.

"Sophia." She shifted further back into the shadows

"What happened, Sophia?" He unbuckled his cloak, folding it and then carefully setting it on the ground in front of her burrow. It was well into summer, but the nights were still cold beneath the trees. She didn't look to be wearing much, but he wasn't sure if she'd accept the peace offering.

"I was serving at the public house." She sniffled miserably but made no attempt to grab for the cloak. "There was a group of strangers there that all paid good money so the owner said to me 'be nice to them, girl' even though I didn't like them above half. One says to me to go bring a plate of food to his friend in the stable, so I go. Only, when I got there two of them tied me up and shoved me in a sack! They said they were going to sell me in the southlands!"

"Highwaymen, then." Raziel sighed. "We've gotten word from some of the other villages with complaints, but had not run across them yet. You got away, it seems. Are you injured?"

"They stole my dress!" Sophia whispered bitterly. Seeming to have thought it over for long enough, she reached a hand out to first prod at, then retrieve the offered cloth. A few shuffling noises hinted at her draping it around herself. "They got me out of town right under the nose of that fool Dirk at the gate. I tried to shout. I did. But I could scarce breathe with the sackcloth and all… I was jounced along on the back of a horse for what felt like hours. I thought I was half way to Willendorf when they stopped to rest. If it wasn't bad enough me being treated like baggage all that time, they took me down and stole my dress and told me I was to do whatever they wanted if I didn't want to get beat." Hiding her face in her hands again, she shook her head urgently. "I wasn't going to do anything like _that_ so I ran! They weren't expecting that."

"No. I wager they weren't." Raziel had to chuckle at that, easily able to imagine the astounded looks on the thugs faces when their quailing virgin up and bolted into the trees in nothing but her under-shift. "I take it they didn't catch you."

"They didn't tie me very well." She stated as if sharing a confidence. "I got the knots out by biting them while I ran. After that… I'm good at hiding." Sophia hugged her knees. "I always won those games as a child. Used to hide for hours in my attic and mum could never find me." She sighed softly. "You found me."

"I heard you crying." Raziel confessed. Sparing a moment to look around their little patch of the woods, he could see nothing else that could threaten or upset the girl. Other than himself, at any rate. He crouched down again to peer in at her. "Well, it sounds as though you've had a bit of an adventure today. But I think I really ought to take you home now. It's quite late, and you don't belong out here."

Sophia crept to the edge of her shelter to peer at him wide-eyed. "You'd do that? You're not going to eat me?"

"I'm not particularly hungry just now." He shrugged. "Besides, your village is known to us. It wouldn't do to eat a neighbor without due cause. Come." He held a hand out to her, "Let me assist you."

Another tediously long pause and the girl seemed to accept him at last. Crawling free of her burrow, she took his hand as she sought to gain her feet. Pretty, but not beautiful, Sophia smiled bashfully for him as she sought to smooth the leaves out of her messy hair and still keep her borrowed cloak wrapped discreetly around her. From monster to nobleman, Raziel recognized her re-assessment of his character and allowed her the moment to organize herself. Young women of the region did not greet their betters in their underclothes. "I'm the weaver's daughter, milord." She bobbed a small curtsey. "Thank you for helping me."

"I am Raziel." He guided her around the tree, or tried to. The girl took a step and immediately faltered with a cry of pain. "You _are_ injured. Where is hurt?" He turned back to her, uncertain of what precisely was wrong, and what propriety would allow him to do about it.

"Just my ankle, blood-lord. I twisted it as I was running." She bent down to rub at it and then tried to hobble forward again, determined to walk despite the pain. "I though given a rest, it'd be well enough, but it hurts like blazes."

"I fear I am no doctor." Raziel let her lean on his arm as he considered the additional information. "But surely you have one in the village."

"We do." Her eyes looked wet with fresh tears. "But I do not think I can walk that far."

"It's a good think I have a horse then, isn't it." Raziel shook his head at how easily she was dismayed. "If I may?" Not waiting for her to give her permission he expedited their trip back to the road by simply picking the slender girl up and carrying her.

Walking twenty miles with the girl in his arms might have been a nuisance, but getting her as far as his mount was an easy matter. She blushed and fidgeted in his arms but otherwise made no protest. Petting the animal's nose to soothe it for the upcoming upset, he positioned the girl on her feet next to his saddle and eyed the distance candidly. "You ever ride a horse before?"

"No, milord."

"Right." He sighed. "I'm going to throw you up into the saddle. Try and get a good grip on the front and back once you can, or you may go up and over by accident and we'll both feel like fools, alright?"

"I'll try, sir."

Having never performed the service for a girl before, Raziel was a little leery of how much force to apply, but somehow they managed on the first try. Sitting sideways on his long-suffering mount, Sophia shifted a little to find a less precarious perch, and then tucked his cloak around her slim legs. Looking along the road, she frowned as she got her bearings. "Which way do we go?"

""West." He gathered the horse's reins and tugged the creature away from its grazing. "Won't be more than an hour. Hold tight now until you grow used to the swaying. I won't walk him fast."

"Thank you milord."

"I'm no lord, Sophia." He had to laugh at her continued genuflection. Apparently now that he wasn't going to eat her he'd been elevated to the position of savior. "I'm just a vampire."

"Mum told me to always be polite to blood-born." The girl disagreed. "Besides, you _are_ a lord. You have a horse, and a sword…"

"Both borrowed." Raziel discouraged her.

"You have rich clothes, and boots." She wasn't swayed.

"Gifted to me by my betters." He shook his head with a smile.

Sophia hid her giggle behind her hand. "I wager you can even read and write… And not just your own name!"

Raziel nodded. "Now there I confess I am guilty as charged. But that means that at most I'm a scholar, that doesn't make me a noble."

"Well you're certainly not from a village like mine." She remarked tartly, warming to their conversation. "You talk like a lord. And you're hansom as one. Why then should you not wish to be called as such?"

"It's just odd, I suppose." He shrugged, guiding the horse, and with it the girl, along the road. He didn't know what to say to her compliments so it seemed best to just overlook them. "I'm barely a soldier, more of a squire, I suppose."

She laughed again. "Well a squire is usually the _son_ of someone important, isn't he? So that would make you like a lord-in-training, wouldn't it…"

"You are quite insistent." He laughed as they came to the top of the hill.  
The small junction of roads left him examining their options. "Mühlendorf? Or Stienbergdolf? He looked back and asked her.

Sophia was mute, staring behind her as well. Following her gaze Raziel blinked to see torchlight in the distance. In looking he could hear them as well, the clatter of running horses over the packed dirt. Only madmen and vampires dared run their horses at night even with the benefit of a full moon to help light the road. "The valley seems busy this evening," he remarked mostly to himself as he drew his sword in preparation for the unknown.

"Are they brigands?" The girl clung to his mount as he turned the beast around.

Waiting for them to crest the hill Raziel finally got a clear view despite the wildly blowing capes and torch-flames. He exhaled in relief when one profile in particular became as familiar as his own. "No. Vampires."

Sliding his sword back into its scabbard he raised his hand in hail instead. Turel shouted something to the lean-faced woman next to him and the pair reined in their mounts, forcing the rest of their party to do the same. Raiel took the precaution of backing his horse onto the edge of the road to yield the majority of the highway to his brother's hunt.

"And a fair evening to you, brother?" He raised an eyebrow at his sibling's dramatic entrance. "Where are you off to in such a hurry, I wonder…"

"Such a night as this is too fine for sedate living." Turel leaned forward to smile at him, clearly energized by his recent activities. "It is for running… and for hunting. We have just had marvelous sport, Raziel, it was a shame you missed it."

Raziel couldn't help but grin at his brother's good cheer. It was rare to se Turel enjoy himself to such a degree. Glancing towards the woman riding beside him, he noted she too had a flushed, pleased look about her. Sitting easily astride her horse she looked even more the huntress than ever before, flanked on both sides by her sisters in arms. Raziel leaned a little closer under the guise of patting his sibling's horse. "I'd say it'd have been a shame if I'd been underfoot, from the looks of things. And I'll wager good coin that that a different sort of sport might await you tonight so long as you don't dally too long in getting home."

Turel bit his cheek to keep from laughing, gesturing behind him towards where a string of un-used mounts were being led on a long tether. Several of the saddles were repurposed for carrying cargo, one had a crude bag of twisted netting full of what seemed to be heads. The other had a gibbering human hog-tied and draped like a sack of wheat. "We heading in that direction very soon. But for the moment we are on our way to make a delivery, as you see. We were given to understand that these fine gentlemen were owing restitution to the villages of the valley, and so we thought we'd do our part as land-barons to reunite these two sides now divided."

"Or what's left of them." Raziel shook his head at the lonely last bandit. Keeping him alive was a token gesture, a straw man for the villagers to poke with sticks, or do whatever they pleased with. The rest had undoubtedly been eaten, their heads kept as trophy after the fact.

"You seem to have had some success in hunting as well." Turel nodded to the girl Raziel was escorting. "What is she to be? A meal for tomorrow? Or a new serving wench for the fortress? A pretty pillow perhaps."

"None of these, brother." He shrugged. "It seems we are both delivery boys this evening. Although I should think mine was a trifle easier to come by. I found her lamed under a hedge through no fault of her own. I'm taking her home."

Turel blinked and gave him a long look. "You _found_ her."

"Yes. I just said that." Raziel patted his brother's horse again, smiling up at the befuddled vampire.

"And you're taking her _home_." Rubbing his forehead, his brother sighed in defeat. "You are unbelievable. Do you know that?"

Raziel laughed. "You can't tell me you're hungry. You just ran down ten bandits with your friends. That's enough food to tide even your oversized carcass until daybreak. Leave off this little one, she's barely a mouthful as it is."

"It's very sweet of you, Raziel." Turel's huntress smiled down at him, ignoring her companion's frustrated gestures. "It will no doubt increase your already shining reputation amongst my sisters when I tell them of your chivalry."

"My lady you are too kind." He bowed slightly, "It is more likely they'll mock my loss of opportunity than anything else, as my brothers shall."

Tossing her blonde braid over her shoulder the vampiress shifted the quiver and bow slung across her back to a more comfortable spot as she looked over at Turel knowingly. "If anyone does mock you, they shall answer for it. There is nothing shameful in acting kindly towards our neighbors. The friendship of the valley is important to us. It proves that vampire and human can dwell together without anarchy…"

"It must be as you say, my lady." Turel bowed in submission to the woman's speech, both acknowledging her superiority and undoubtedly trying to regain her good opinion. Thankfully, she didn't look the sort to hold a grudge. Patting his brother's knee at the same time as addressing Sophia, the woman attempted a kind smile for the girl's benefit. "Your home is…"

"Mühlendorf, my lady vampire." Raziel looked over his shoulder to see the poor girl was actually trembling, sitting as straight as an arrow in the saddle as she submitted to inspection. What she made of the party of warrior women before her he couldn't guess. Sophia's looked seemed to be one of absolute awe. "As it please you, lady, these men… they're the ones who tried to put the slave chain on me…"

"Then it seems their punishment was timely indeed." The woman smiled brilliantly in the torchlight, her fangs evident in her fierce grin. "I despise that sort of man the most of all villains. However I fear your neighbors have prior claim on this survivor… he and his friends caused some considerable mayhem last night. I shall inform them on delivery however of your complaint. I'm sure the headman will invite you to witness whatever punishment they decide on, should you wish."  
"Thank you my lady."

"In that case, I'll leave you in Raziel's excellent company child, that is… unless of course you would much rather to join my sisters and I? You might find life with us a most rewarding experience…"

Biting his tongue to hide his surprise, Raziel shot Turel an incredulous look. His brother returned it with one of resigned amusement. The recruiting ability of Vorador's wives was famed for more than just their knack of scooping up wayward mercenaries with a wink and a smile. He doubted Sophia would be the first, or the last farm-girl who'd been initiated into their sisterhood after being dazzled by the womens' prowess.

"As it please you… I feel I should best return home. That is, if you'll pardon me." The girl stuttered and raised her hands in hesitant refusal. "It's only that my father is old, lady, and I know the business, that and I have a friend waiting who says he'll make me a good husband… so thanking you kindly…"

"You have only to call at the fortress any afternoon, if you should ever change your mind. Tell them that you are a friend of Teegan and you shall be well looked after." With a wave of her torch and a shout, she and Turel were moving past them, picking up speed as they turned through the crossing and disappeared on the north road.

Raziel shook his head in amazement at the woman's poise. "There, Sophia, goes a noblewoman for you. Come. We'll get you home."

Walking another quarter mile in silence he found his charge to be much startled by their chance encounter. Luckily he knew the route to her town well enough to get there without guidance. Only when the stockade became visible from the road did Sophia shake off her shock and return to herself. "And to think, until tonight I'd only ever met two vampires my whole life, and never by name…"

"Well I can't say I've known that many humans so far in my life, so I'd say we're about square." He snorted in amusement as he banged his fist on the wooden gate. "Hey now. Gate-man. I have a lost sheep that needs returning to the fold! Open up!"

"Who goes there? Man or Vampire?" A surly voice called from the other side.

"Both, my-sleepy-steward. I am a tenant of the Sanctuary by the lake. But I have with me Sophia, the weaver's daughter whom I discovered along the road in some distress. Will you take her off my hands? Or will you be so unkind as to compel me to leave her standing here helpless until morning comes?"

"For god's sake, Dirk, open the damned door." Sophia cried to the man. "I'm only out here thanks to you being too stupid to see I was being taken in the first place."

The bar was lifted and the side-gate opened to a fearful looking man with a mace. "It _is_ you, girl. Your parents have been worrying themselves sick. Where you been?!"

Helping her down from his horse, Raziel bowed over her hand, and then gestured she could make good her escape. "Send the cloak along with whomever does your bartering with us, Sophia, there's no rush."

She blushed and smiled at him. "I did not think there were vampires such as you, milord. Thank you. Thank you a thousand times."

"I am your servant, madam." He swung up into his saddle, wondering if he could still beat Turel home if he cut overland. Undoubtedly the gossip would be flying fast and hot. If he was going to be laughed at as a kindhearted fool, at least he wanted to be present to defend himself against the more absurd exaggerations.


	16. Chapter 16

**Legacy of Kain: Once and Future King**

AU/continuation- fic of Defiance

The Beginning – Chapter 7

(note that chapter content has been edited to comply with regulations full version posted elsewhere)

8 8 8 8 8

R A Z I E L

Raziel was grooming his horse, enjoying a quiet moment of solitude in the stables when he turned to find he was being observed. Umah, in all her dark glory, was leaning against the doorway, watching him with her predatory eyes.

"Odd, that you don't get a servant to do that." She remarked, folding her arms across her waist. He wondered silently whether her habitual gesture was because it was physically impossible, given her assets, to mimic Vorador's authoritative posture more faithfully, or whether she did it deliberately to force a man to recognize her awe inspiring cleavage. He firmly told his eyes to stay above her cape's collar as he nodded in polite greeting.

"You say nothing? Strange, you've never been shy before." Umah pushed herself upright, slinking closer through the musty space. All around the various mounts and beasts of the citadel paused in their grazing and looked up, noticing her aura with nervous shifting and snorting. The horses were well adapted to the scents and mannerisms of their lords and masters, but a predator was a predator. Raziel didn't blame them for shying and taking a second look as she passed.

"I didn't realize you were asking a question." He murmured. Raziel wondered to himself whether he was being seduced or hunted, and let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding when she turned at the last minute to inspect his mount's head. "A fine animal. Kain chooses well."

"Usually." Raziel hedged. Even after years' worth of casual encounters in the halls and gardens of the manor and citadel, it was still distracting in the extreme to stand next to the powerful vampiress. Although as tall as a man, there was nothing masculine about her. Her scent was as tantalizing as the high-cut skirt she favored when not in armor. "Is there something I can assist you with, my lady?"

"I hear you are to be congratulated on yet another feat of infant-heroism, boy." She smirked, running her fingers through the animal's mane before patting it. "You're beginning to make a habit of it, in fact."

He winced at how quickly the news had spread, back on the receiving end of the extended clan's bemused stares for the second time in so many years. It wasn't like he set out of an evening to cause a spectacle. Things just seemed to happen around him, he sighed. Thankfully Kain was away and not available to pass summary judgment on his latest antics. He had no doubt he'd have his scolding later when his sire returned. "Many tell me I am destined to a short but exciting life at the rate I am going."

Umah laughed at that. "I like you Raziel." She turned to him with a sudden fierce smile. "You aren't like the others, all bragging and brawn. At first I was inclined to be as disgusted with you and yours as I was with Kain's first bunch of bootlickers. But you are a knight of the old orders compared to that scum."

Turning back to his horse, she scratched its chin playfully, long fingers sliding lovingly over its nose and neck with what had to be intentional double-meaning. "You talk more like Janos, than a fledgling. It will serve you well with us women when you grow up. Don't become like your older brothers. Or even your younger ones…"

"I would hardly call all of my siblings crude, Lady." Raziel added Umah's hands to the list of things he really ought to stop staring at if he didn't want to make a fool of himself. Unfortunately the number of things a man could not look at without distraction while talking to Umah included just about everything above her boots. The woman was sensuality incarnate. Swallowing he wracked his brain for idle conversation that wouldn't annoy the infamous warlady. "I would say my brother Melchiah, for example, is entirely harmless."

"Melchiah is a good boy." Umah smirked. "Perhaps too good. I find I lose my appetite for sweetness for days after only a moment in his company."

"He is full young yet." Raziel conceded. "Time and war will no doubt roughen him up a little."

"Not like you." She turned back to him, leaning with unconscious artistry against the shoulder of the animal. "You, I think, will be always as you are now. Perhaps a little older, a little wiser, a little more handsome?"

"I could not hazard a prediction." He replied honestly, surprised by the compliment. It was unlike her to speak so kindly. Usually it meant he was in trouble over something, or about to be. "Growing older is inevitable, if I do not die. It is my ambition to be wiser. Whether I am handsome or not, is for others to decide."

Umah leaned forward and kissed him, swiftly and powerfully. Her mouth barely gave him time to react, lips and tongue committing soft acts of violent invasion as they explored his own. Raziel felt like an idiot as she pulled away, smiling archly at her conquest. The best he had managed was to gasp like a virgin as she had worked her charms on him. The urge to reach out and wrap his hands around her irresistibly slender waist and attempt a second kiss made his groin ache.

Raziel forced himself to relax, knowing _exactly_ what the woman's reaction to such adolescent impulses would be. Not a week ago he had seen Zephon's bruised face from where one of Umah's 'sisters' had schooled his sibling in the appropriate way to court a woman. He had no interest in learning a similar lesson first hand.

"So polite." She remarked, reaching out to slide appreciative fingers along his jaw. "I can see why you're everyone's favorite. There's quite the war brewing over you, you know. If only you were a little older."

"Why?" Raziel couldn't help but ask, dazzled by the touch.

Umah laughed, and kissed him again. This time at least he was able to coordinate an amateur effort in response but any hope of appearing competent was quickly crushed. Her tongue coiled around his easily, her long-nailed fingers scratching as his scalp as she pined his face between her hands. Raziel sighed at the powerful rush of blood to his groin, half fearing, half wanting the woman to take another step forward and press against him with her kiss to soothe the ache she was causing. Luckily for his sanity, she refrained from pressing her advantage. The warlady pulled back, relinquishing his mouth with a look of mild regret. Brushing her lips against his a third time, she murmured, "I don't sleep with children," and turned to leave.

Raziel stood slack-jawed and stunned as she swept away. Out of the stable and across the courtyard; Umah didn't bother to look back as she got in a parting shot. "I look forward to continuing our conversation, Sir Raziel. When you're a little older!"

Exhaling slowly, Raziel took stock and found his body still thrumming from her touch. He forced himself to stare at the boring curry comb in his hands until he felt marginally in control, and resumed his work on the horse. Umah was maddening. Most of Vorador's wives were. Knowing as they did how their charms and strength affected men, they delighted in taunting and then rejecting suitors on a regular basis. Vorador loved choosing the 'man eater' type, when looking for women for the cabal. Whether it was because he knew they'd make fine soldiers, or simply due to his own particular fetish, Raziel couldn't guess.

The only way to handle it was to not fall into the trap. If one could maintain a certain mental distance, as Kain did, then it was possible to remain rational despite their teasing. Think too much about one of the amazons' seductive wiles, and even the most level-headed vampire could become little better than a slavering desperate toy for the women's amusement. Raziel forced himself to adopt a little of his master's jaded manner, finding that even the pretended cynicism helped his blood to cool.

"I wouldn't be too eager, brother, to take that woman up on her offer."

Raziel nearly spooked his horse as he flinched. Glancing over his shoulder into the shadowy hayloft, he breathed a little easier to see Rahab limberly swinging himself down out of the rafters. His quiet brother had a knack for discrete hiding places. Raziel wondered how long he had been lurking in this one. At least it was Rahab and not one of the others more inclined to laughing at his mistakes. He rubbed his neck feeling foolish. "You saw that?"

"Oh yes." Standing beside him, Rahab patted his horse and looked out into the courtyard, as if assuring himself that the lady was gone. His long face often had a melancholy look, but when he turned Raziel was gifted with one of his sibling's rare and wicked smiles. "Very entertaining."

"Well at least _you_ were entertained." Raziel sighed, annoyed. "I felt a fool."

"I think that sensation is shared by most of her prey." His thoughtful brother agreed, removing a bit of hay from his collar and discarding it as he tidied himself clean of debris from the loft. "You will not be the first, or the last, caught flat-footed by her."

"With lips to make a man dream of sin." He remembered the quote but not the author. The words felt more than appropriate enough, he wondered if the mortal who wrote them knew Umah at all.

"Hersh, 'The Fatal Woman'." Rahab was quick enough to supply the reference. He made an annoyed sound. "I fail to see what attracts you all to her ilk. Whenever _I_ see her I am reminded of stories of wolves on the prowl. I don't like the idea of a lover who will just as likely eat me as lay with me."

"Either way, what a night it would be." Raziel laughed.

"Idiot." His brother cuffed him lightly on the arm. "Besides, from what I've heard, you might not enjoy it as much as you think. Umah, especially, is rumored to be hard on her men, for all that they go crawling back to her whenever they get the chance."

"Oh? Does she leave bruises?" Raziel speculated. "Or does she sharpen her claws on their backs?"

Rahab shook his head, smirking. "I've heard stories of rope. Sometimes chains. Of being made to worship at her shrine in various prolonged and frustrating ways. I suppose she has a thing for toying with prisoners."

Raziel gave his brother an astonished look. "Chains?!"

"Chains." The vampire confirmed grimly. "And begging on your knees."

"Begging." For a moment he was horrified, and then, to his chagrin, curious. While he had admired his fair share of the women around him, he'd not yet found one face in particular that could tempt him into pursuit. Unlike Dumah, who he'd already accidentally stumbled across on several occasions with his pants down, or even his other siblings with their more sedate exploits, he had spent his first year at the fortress enjoying the relative privacy of his rooms… without the need for female companionship. Grimly he wondered whether Rahab had taken a lover yet. With his brother's taciturn nature it was impossible to say. He wasn't the sort to gossip of his exploits.

If so, then it was down to he and Melchiah as to whom would be last. In his brother's case it was a matter of overcoming his puppyish demeanor, and setting aside his experiments, long enough to convince a girl he was able to perform between the sheets. Raziel rubbed the back of his neck, sighing at his own indecisiveness. He could tell when women were interested in him. Probably if one were to single him out he wouldn't say no. But to pick one out from the crowd was to incite jealousy in all the others. He wasn't quite ready yet to take on that particular battle, not when he couldn't honestly bring himself to care about one woman more than any other.

Vampire women were complicated. Not like Sophia and the other human girls of the valley, he mused. By comparison, the farm-girls and tradesmen's daughters were akin to field sparrows, timid and pleasing in their way, but not something a man felt particularly worth catching when there were falcons and hawks to be had. Even among the loveliest hawks however, he felt liking, but never any particular passion. Raziel smirked at the apparent flaw in his well-advertised perfection. Thinking about his supposed laurels only reminded him of Umah's unsolicited compliments. There perhaps was a woman he'd have, if only for the experience.

"Umah, is not one whom I'd describe a blushing barmaid who lifts her shirt and calls it seduction." Rahab laughed softly, able to read his changing expression. "She'll make you work for whatever satisfaction you hope to get. But as you say, what a night?"

They stood a long moment in brotherly awe of the vampiress' prowess. Gesturing to Raziel's mount, Rahab hinted silently that he might as well finish the chore. His brother found a cloth and helped rub the animal down without being asked.

"Do you think she chains Vorador?" Raziel found himself wondering, and also cringing, at the mental image.

Rahab stood up from rubbing the animal's leg to give him a nauseous look. "It doesn't bear considering."

* * * * *

K A I N

What better way to celebrate his return to the cabal after a successful treaty signing with Willendorf than with an old-fashioned hedonistic party in the great hall?

The treaty itself wasn't much, as yet, just a mutual agreement to non-aggression in the territories surrounding the highway and northern villages, but still, it was a start. It was a deviation from history, he acknowledged, but easing his way into the old city's good graces was far less labor intensive than sacking it. Time he could spare, men were far more valuable. He needed them for the human kingdoms he _couldn't_ sweet-talk into line. Tapping his claws thoughtfully against the arm of his chair, he watched vampires of both sexes swaying in eachothers' arms and playing wildly on their instruments as others supped from wide-brimmed goblets and talked. The soldiers and children looked to be enjoying themselves.

Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Dumah already chasing lewder pleasures with a clinging girl half hidden behind a curtain. The chatting mobs around them ignored the impropriety. Fledgling antics. He sighed, seeking out the less depressingly common of his children from the crowd. Turel had a long-legged beauty on his arm and was actually managing to appear somewhat urbane as he swept her around the edge of the line of dancers. Undoubtedly someone had taken him aside in the months since he'd seen the boy last and given him some lessons in correct personal grooming. He looked less the part of grunt-soldier than usual. The woman's name escaped him but he recognized her as one of Umah's many captains. Likewise Zephon was dancing intimately with another amazon. The woman boasted a ferocious smile, and his younger general seemed alternately pleased by his conquest and a little intimidated by her. Biting off more than he'd anticipated, from the look of things. Undoubtedly he'd be sporting some interesting bruises by dawn, but braggart that he was, he'd spin the encounter in his favor in the retelling.

The others were ensconced among friends, laughing and chatting, and looking pleased with both the festivities. The news that when next he took an army into the field, they would be marching with him had to also be a welcome reason to celebrate. Eyes unconsciously seeking, and finding, Raziel, Kain smiled to himself at how the boy managed to almost shine when surrounded by the lesser quality stock of his company. Both proud of the child and envious of the attention he was giving others, he admired the tight leathers of his trousers as they fitted over the fledgling's hips and the easy grace with which he gestured animatedly in making his point.

His beauty was all the more captivating in that he wore it without pretense, his laughter was merry, his interest in conversation unfeigned. He glittered like an uncut gem, an infant still, but one whose potential was visible to anyone with eyes to see it. Raziel's crowd of admirers contained equal numbers of both sexes, the women measuring their chances with the boy with predatory smiles, the men similarly jockeying for a position at his side, cautiously hopeful that he might prefer one of them instead. For his part Raziel was oblivious to the subtle maneuvering around him, as content as ever with his lot in life and seemingly indifferent to the idea of taking a lover at all, despite the wealth of opportunity in front of him. In two hundred years, Raziel might seduce an entire room simply by walking into it, but for now his crowd of admirers was held at arms length.

Kain leaned back further into his chair. Resting his shoulders against the Reaver blade he wore tucked against his back, he considered the problem of his eldest's as yet unfocused charisma. It wouldn't be impossible, he mused, to direct the child's attention towards himself, as malleable as the boy was. There was loyalty enough, even in Raziel's infant state, to play upon if he were determined to lay claim to what was rightfully his. Alternatively he might choose to steer the child towards a youthful consort of his preference, to further mold and prepare him for his life to come. Tilting his head a little he caught sight of the Reaver's pommel out of the corner if his eye. The skull's shadowy sockets glowed faintly with the light of the power contained within. Even sleeping, the weapon seemed to sense his discontent, humming softly to him in it's silent way as it sought to give comfort.

Kain reached back to caress his old friend with a gentle claw-tip, taking in the worn strapping of the grip, and making note to himself to rebind the blade before their next battle. Otherwise the sword was practically invulnerable, even more-so than he was. He huffed in quiet amusement at his preoccupation with the soul blade's wellbeing. Never had a weapon been so cherished. Still, live would be impossible without it, unimaginable even. Its warm length was comfortable against him after so many years of having it there, even in social settings like this one. If anything the wicked blade was the only thing he found entirely comfortable about the evening.

He was too old, he mused, for such festivities.

He'd attended any number of celebrations, victorious routs, and feast-days over the centuries. After a while the unchanging formula of music, chatter, and dancing wasn't all that exciting. If he had to choose between the decadent party and simply sweeping Raziel off to someplace quiet and comfortable for a bit of relaxation, he knew which he'd choose. For a moment the idle fantasy tempted him. Kain could well imagine the willing warmth of the fledgling's limbs as the boy leaned against his shoulder and permitted the embrace. He might turn his face into Raziel's hair and lose himself for hours in the subtle scent of the vampire's body. That might have been a welcome-home to hurry him back, he mused, had he anticipated such a thing being within the realm of the possible.

From there it was no great stretch to picture the youth's shirt loosened, his pale skin exposed to moonlight and to Kain's questing tongue. Kain slouched further into his chair with an annoyed sigh, telling himself to stop thinking of things that would only make him horny and irritated. More than ten centuries old, his body was usually beyond such juvenile rebellions. He marveled how even now, with the gulf of years and experience standing between them, he could still find Raziel's appearance so… inspiring. Telling himself it was a ridiculous notion didn't stop his mind from wandering. His imagination simply switched his tongue out for someone else's. Raziel, trembling and eager, as some woman explored every inch of his chest? His cocky grin as both of them shed their clothing with frantic motions, desperate to find release? The mental image caused a tingle down his spine that instantly pooled into a tight heat in his groin. Kain forced himself to stare at his goblet for a few minutes, breathing through his nose as he considered the mundane bit of glassware and got his body back under control.

Of course, his subconscious whispered wickedly, it could always be a man instead. Raziel kneeling before some well-endowed vampire? _There_ was a thing of beauty to contemplate. He shifted in his chair feeling his pants constrict again. Luckily nobody was trying to corner him with small talk. He hid his sudden hunger behind the edge of his cup as he sipped the warm blood. It tasted stale in his mouth, his tongue craving a different flavor altogether.

Clearly it'd been far too long since he'd last found some relief, because the fragments of memory and fantasy merged into uncannily realistic daydream all too easily. Kain closed his eyes and for a moment could see Raziel being taken from behind. How sublime the vampire had looked when they'd indulged in such games once upon a time. Kain remembered fondly the oversized mirror he'd had mounted next to his bed during the early part of the Dark Empire just for that purpose. Watching Raziel brought to the point of ecstasy had been one of the less sadistic pleasures he'd taken with the vampire, leaving the memories relatively guilt-free when compared with the others.

The fact that it was absolutely impossible to indulge in such sport with Raziel any time in the near future was clearly Nosgoth's way of exacting penance from him for his myriad sins. Kain sighed, body cooling again at the depressing thought. Evolved as he was, there was little he could do with hand, mouth or body that could bring pleasure to one as young and fragile as his fledgling lieutenant. Comparing the two of them practically, he counseled himself to accept the reality of his situation. He was nothing but a collection of diamond sharp teeth and claws, monstrously oversized muscles, hardened callused skin. The child was all too human in his frailty, and would be for years yet to come. Best to wait for any chance of that sort of closeness, if there was to be any between them, until the boy could at least regenerate enough to heal the inevitable scratches and bruises he'd pick up in trying to be intimate with a lumpish bit of basalt like him. Undoubtedly Raziel would learn of passion on his own soon enough. He silenced the petty little voice within him that protested that there wasn't a creature alive that could match _his_ passion for the vampire with practiced brutality. Such thoughts were childish and he refused to acknowledge them.

Kain turned to look around the room instead of thinking further on the depressing topic. He noted Vorador's happy little party of womenfolk circling him like the harem they were. The old bastard was basking in their playful seduction as always. Even Janos looked to be in a sociable mood. The usually bashful old scholar was cuddled on a long couch in with some of the women-folk who tended to the general upkeep of the fortress. The blue skinned ancient's grip on the girl in his lap wasn't _entirely_ innocent to Kain's jaded eye, although with the old one it was hard to tell. For their part the girls were more then happy to fawn on Janos as much as he'd let them.

The pair of ancients brought another batch of recruits over the mountains for him, and used that as their excuse to linger long enough for the feast before returning to their retired comforts at the manor house. Kain shook his head at their determination to continue to assist with the 'cause' from a safe distance. Unless pressed into action, Vorador would far rather heckle from the sidelines than wade into the middle of the action. He didn't mind. The army functioned best with a single dedicated leader. Having all three of them stomping about, countermanding eachother's orders would have driven the young ones daft. The green furred vampire lord caught his eye and raised an eyebrow expressively.

_Sulking at our own party, are we?_ Yellow eyes twinkled as the vampire silently laughed at him. _If you dislike feasts so, why do you encourage them?_

_Because they're good for morale._ Kain whispered back, recognizing that he _was_ playing the part of sulky bear more than usual. Sitting up he rolled his shoulders and forced a slightly more congenial expression onto his face. Not that he ever had mastered the knack of looking 'happy' without it twisting into something vaguely homicidal, but he could at least manage to not be _quite_ so antisocial. _And besides_, he thought towards his friend across the room, __You_ like them well enough. This is the first time you've spent more than two days at the citadel in years._

_I don't like this place._ Vorador grimaced, momentarily distracted by the late arrival of yet another wife who greeted him exuberantly. _This citadel holds too many memories for me, Kain. _The old vampire continued over the top of the oblivious woman's head. _None of them particularly pleasant. Until now. _

_I know the feeling_. He sighed, motivating himself to stand. _Moebius may be dead, old friend, but he is not forgotten. Not yet._

The festivities would easily last until morning, but Kain felt in his bones that he was done. The children would likely party all the merrier when out from under his gloomy stare. He ducked down several side passages and out onto a stretch of parapet above the lake, admiring the sparkling white of the moonlight on the water. On the surface at least, it seemed a beautiful bit of scenery. He folded his arms and considered the valley thoughtfully.

There was nothing at the bottom of _this_ lake. Not yet. He'd checked very carefully when he'd first laid claim to the fortress, not interested in repeating that particular historical blunder. The fledglings had stared in slack jawed awe as he'd gone looking for monsters by the simple expedient of wading out into the lake until the water was over his head, trusting the weight of his armor and the Soul Reaver's earthy affinity to keep him stuck to the lakebed rather than bobbing about like a vampiric bit of cork. The Reaver's ability to grant him invulnerability to the elements was also a blessing when it came to accomplishing such a feat. For all his prowling in the muddy depths, he'd found some mysterious looking ruins from a former age, a variety of startled fish, and a god-awful amount of weedy, aquatic, plant-life, but no false gods. Not so much as one frog-like eyeball to annoy him. It'd been over a hundred years, he mused, since he last terrified the children by going for a swim. Maybe it was time to check again? It never hurt to be cautious.

"What are you up to, my dear 'wheel'?" He mused aloud. "You've been rather quiet lately. If you will not come to me, I shall be obliged to seek you…"

The lake gave no answer. For the best really, if it had he'd have felt a nasty shock. Folding his arms on the smooth stonewall before him, Kain couldn't help but speculate on the coming year, what battles they could expect, what battles they might avoid by yet more politicking with the human lords. Having allies at hand whom could fight in daylight would make dealing with the Hylden considerably easier. Now of only he could convince the short-lived fools to stop killing each other long enough to prepare a reasonable force for killing _other_ things. The nearby kingdoms were a harder-bunch to convince than he'd hoped. The factions constantly urging the government to go on and on about the unholy vampiric plague, were also troublingly prevalent. Undoubtedly, they were being encouraged by one or more parties who preferred to operate from the shadows. Kain rubbed his chin thoughtfully. It was amusing, really, the need for a human resistance, when it wasn't precisely clear what they were meant to be resisting. Still it wasn't like he had infinite amounts of time to make them see reason. Kain chuckled softly to himself. They'd come around. As frightening as he realized _he_ looked, the Hylden would be worse.

"Vorador said you'd be brooding out here." A teasing voice caught him by surprise. Turning his head, Kain raised his eyebrow at the woman who'd slid up to him while he was distracted.

"Did he?" He dipped his chin, acknowledging the lady's question. She was lovely, after a fashion. Like most of Umah's captains, she had a lean, lissome look, and moved with the confidence of a hunter even with the long skirts trapping her legs. Her face was familiar but he couldn't immediately match a name to it. "And which one of his witches are you?"

"Lykestra." She folded her arms across her chest and gave him a knowing look. "My lord said to me, 'Kain appears lonely tonight'."

Kain had to smile at that. Trust Vorador to only have one solution in mind when presented with a problem. "And so he dispatched you to what, cheer me?"

"Something like that." She leaned against the wall next to him, taking a moment to admire the view. Turning to look at him she granted him an unusually candid smile, not pretending in the least to be ashamed of her blatant flirtation. "I told him that I doubted you'd be interested. Seeing as how I've never heard of you needing 'cheering' before now. But he insisted that I might suit you as well as anyone. So here I am."

"I appreciate the gesture." Kain shook his head at the old vampire's stubborn insistence that sex was not something a man could just opt out of for years at a time. He was living proof that a vampire could, and would find other means to entertain himself besides taking every opportunity to nestle his phallus between every willing wench's thighs that he came across. He couldn't remember the last time he'd had a woman. Beyond centuries ago, he mused, at the very least. There'd been a pressing lack of availability he supposed, never mind opportunity, as the Dark Empire crumbled to ruins and dust around him. In this new Nosgoth, everyone was just so… _young_. He clenched his teeth as the thought immediately reminded him of his wishful thinking from before. _Raziel_ was young, terrifyingly young. So what kind of monster did that make him for still wanting the boy?

Raziel, he told himself pragmatically, had always been a special case. He shook his head again. "You are kind to offer, Lykestra, but your charms are best served by one in better humor, as you can see."

"Is it that you no longer have the capacity?" She raised an eyebrow in bold curiosity. "Your evolution and Lord Vorador's are completely different, after all. Who can say if in gaining one ability, a vampire might not lose another… As a human I could not bear heavy burdens, but now I find even a full-grown man no trouble at all. But in exchange I lost the sun." The woman shrugged thoughtfully. "Not all trades are necessarily good ones."

"A wise thing to realize for a vampire." He agreed. Studying her hands, he could place the woman well past her third evolution. While she still had a full five-fingers, her fingernails had become durable talons, sharpened to keen points. Instead of full boots she wore the open-toed sandals favored by those vampires caught between infancy and full evolution, not quite ready yet to go barefoot but more than able to use her toe-claws for climbing and fighting. He noted her studying him just as openly and smirked for her benefit. "I am intact, if you are in earnest in your questioning. It's merely, difficult for me, to find a partner with the stamina required. This form of mine is not meant for gentleness anymore."

"You might find me more durable than I seem, my lord." She smiled faintly at him. Reaching out she dared to trace the edge of his jaw with the backs of her nails. "Do you think I am weak?"

"That I would never do." He chuckled, enjoying her company despite himself. Like Umah, she was not afraid of him in the least. Unlike Umah, she was frank and lighthearted in her conversation. Watching her idly comb her fingers through her hair – preening for his benefit? – Kain found the sight of her low-necked dress, straining to contain her assets to be somewhat inspirational in its own way. He was no more inclined to bed her than he had been on first glance, but still, he wouldn't mind at all seeing more of her. Maybe it was just her coloring, pale skin and flaxen blonde that made him think it, but she might make a fine match for Raziel, if the boy could be convinced he wanted her.

Kain smiled a little to himself at the thought. Clearly this was a woman who could manage to be convincing, otherwise Vorador would have never sent her.

"Tell me something, Lykestra." He turned to give her his full attention. "Exactly how far were you planning to go, with this 'cheering' you were going to give me?"

"As far as necessary, Lord Scion." She gave him an arch look. "Why, have you changed your mind?"

"Not exactly. But I find myself… convinced, that you might solve a minor problem I've been having, with one of my sons." He shrugged. "If you were willing, of course."

"A problem?" Lykestra raised her eyebrow at his choice of words. "Well that depends on the problem, Scion. And the son."

"Raziel, my eldest. For all the elements in his favor, he still seems to have some difficulty when it comes to knowing how to proceed with a woman on a night such as this. I have been thinking perhaps that some tutoring in this area would not be ill received?"

The woman's burst of surprised laughter confirmed his opinion that she was both willing, and deserving of the delicate mission he was about to put before her.

* * * * *

R A Z I E L

It was all together far easier, Raziel decided as he was backed into his bedroom by a firm grip on his shirt, when it was the woman who did the asking.

One moment he'd been cheerfully engrossed in conversation with some soldiers recently returned from the front. The next minute he had been distracted by the arrival of an amazon with a face that took his breath away. Not merely beautiful, or predatory, she had a focused aura of implacability about her that utterly derailed him from anything but admiration of her form. Another woman might have slapped him half-stupid for staring, but this one? Barely had he managed a 'hello' before she closed in and kissed the breath out of him. The feel of her demanding affection had him hard enough to embarrass himself in moments. Introductions and excuses were nothing more than a blur after that. Raziel was hazily amazed that they'd bothered with the formality of finding some privacy before she'd made good on her stated intent to get in his pants.

Perhaps she was not the woman he might have chosen, he considered as he felt her mouth trailing wet kisses along his jaw and the open collar of his shirt. She had chosen him, however, and he found the concept of being her willing slave for the evening to be far more tantalizing than he had expected. With every lick of her clever tongue, his skin felt tighter, his heart beat faster. Slipping her hands under his loosened clothing, Lykestra dragged her claw-tips lightly down the bare skin of his back, the feathery scratches making his muscles clench in reaction. Was he to be a trophy for her? He wondered idly, responding to her caress with touches of his own, cupping her hips and petting her spine before blindly searching out the laces to her dress. Or was he a dare? Or was she merely the first of his admirers to become frustrated with his laid back approach, and take matters into her own hands? For whatever reason she wanted him. He turned his face against hers, catching her lips with an urgent kiss. Finding her mood infectious, he was surprised to find he fiercely wanted her too.

Before he could offer her a seat on his couch, or even a smile, she had him pressed back against the door, using her superior strength to pin him and take control of the kiss. He moaned in pleasure as she corrected his technique, finding this lesson far more engrossing than anything he'd been studying recently. Lykestra purred happily against his lips as she recognized his willingness to follow her lead. Relinquishing his shirt in favor of catching his face between her hands she worked her tongue into his mouth for several breathless minutes, ruthlessly exploring everything she could reach. Guided by her unspoken demands he let her suck his into her mouth as she reversed their roles, doing his best to give as good as he'd gotten. The urge to press closer to her was impossible to resist. Trying it left him weak in the knees from pleasure and wanting more. The vampiress simply chuckled, pressing forwards again to give him more of what he craved.

"It seems that tongue of your is good for more than poetry after all." She smirked as she pulled away. "Some of my sisters were beginning to wonder…"

"So this venture is purely for… academic research?" Raziel panted at the feel of her hand sliding between them. She rubbed him playfully, her slightly superior expression galling even as her touch made him sigh. He wanted her terribly, but he was determined to not to be an utter novice and finish too soon. That would undoubtedly fail to impress the woman hunting him. He tried to think of anything but sex in the hope of prolonging the encounter slightly. Clearly it was a skill he should have practiced sooner. The defense proved far more difficult to muster than he'd been lead to believe.

Lykestra let her heavy skirt fall to the floor. "Academic research?" She laughed seductively as she kicked the pooled fabric out of the way and invited him to admire her. Tapping her chin in a look of playful speculation she studied him with a smile. "Well… a little perhaps. There's been quite a bit of debate about you after all, dear one. But I think it safe to say my interest in you tonight, is almost entirely personal. You've been hiding behind your books too long, Raziel, your clansmen have despaired at ever … getting to know you better."

Reaching for him with both hands, she smirked again as she helped to undress him. The touch of her hands was nearly his undoing. Raziel clenched his jaw and told himself to at least make it as far as the bed before he made a fool of himself. For her part she seemed amused by his struggles, petting his skin like he was some sort of rare pelt at the market place.

"Very nice." She complemented him as she encouraged him to lean against the wall for support. Pausing to kiss his stomach she nuzzled at the long scar Faustus had left him. "The man was clearly not an art lover." Lykestra looked up at him with a teasing smile when he made to cringe at the unlovely sight before her.

It took a second for his lust-hazed brain to understand the joke. He gasped in weak laughter, "He was… unbearably common, I've been told."

"You forget, sweet Raziel. I've met him." The huntress agreed dryly. "According to my sisters his much-boasted-of 'sword' was more of a dagger, as dull and short as his wit. No woman on the wiser-side of fifty would have anything to do with him." She continued to admire him for several long moments before sighing in contentment. "This sword, however, is as finely crafted as any I've seen. As expected, I suppose, for one of your status. You were built to please, Raziel. There is no doubt."

"But is that a compliment?" He was going to fail miserably, Raziel realized to his dizzy delight. There was no way to hold back with the new sensations pulling him further and further into frenzy. He'd had sex before, he told himself, as a human, surely the feeling of virginal over-stimulation was just a trick of his mind. He was going to lose it soon. Part of him wanted it, with all the attendant embarrassment. The idea of the golden eyed succubus kneeling before him male pride. Undoubtedly she'd punish him for his impatience but whatever abuses were heaped upon him later, he'd have the memory of the powerful woman kneeling at his feet to console him.

Lykestra raised an eyebrow as she looked up at him, seeming to read his fevered thought. "Oh, is there a rebellious spark in you after all, dear boy? I _am_ surprised." She took him firmly in hand, delaying the inevitable. He'd been expecting the amazon to want to toy with him a little. They all seemed to delight in such games. And it seemed she was no exception to the rule.

"For every time you rush me here, sweet prince, I'll collect two more from you in your bed later." The woman looked up at him in playful threat. "If you plan to sleep at all between now and sunset, I suggest you learn some restraint in the upcoming hours?"

"Sleep is-" He gasped as she cut off his bravado by the simple means of releasing her grip. Raziel cursed and near wept at the rush of bliss, fire-hot joy stole the words from his mouth. Coming back to himself afterwards, he swallowed and almost laughed at himself on feeling the parched roughness in his throat. Had he been shouting? He couldn't exactly remember.

Only the fact that Lykestra was leaning against his knees prevented him from sliding down the wall to kneel in front of her in a weak pile of mush. She looked smugly up at him, barely winded from her labors. Damned women. Part of him wanted to roll his eyes at her superior attitude. The rest of him was firmly insisting that doing so would only guarantee that he _not_ feel the outrageously good sensation she gave him again any time soon. Libido won over pride, and he reached down to caress her hair in appreciation. "I- I repay my debts, my lady. Have no fear." It took him two tries to find his voice. That too struck him as funny, but he resisted the urge to laugh for fear she would misunderstand. "Sleep is for the weak."

"_Such_ a good boy. You'll go far, Raziel." She teased with a grin. "But I must confess, it amuses me to think… however inestimable your future lovers may be… That I was the one who had you first."

"But surely that honor goes to my own hand." He smirked down at her, receiving a sharp pinch on his hip for his rebuttal.

"Cheeky, boy, very cheeky. Now pay attention this time. There _will_ be a test later." Lykestra wasted no time in showing him, now that his initial need was spent and his wits returned, just how much better a skilled mouth was when compared with his novice fingers.

* * * * *

K A I N

His plan to send the woman had worked far better than he could have hoped. Kain sighed silently in the shadows of Raziel's bedroom, enjoying the sight of the lissome blond vampires and his lieutenant together. From his hiding place by the open window it was easy to see the entire performance. Scent and sound made the pretty scene all the more alluring. He'd held judgment while she'd repeatedly availed herself of his child against the wall, but with their ensuing tumble into bed Kain had given up any pretense of not enjoying the sight immensely.

No one had paid him any attention as he'd made his way in stealth along the balconies outside. Inviting himself into the private rooms of his eldest had been child's play thanks to the talents he'd gained over the years. It was selfish perhaps, he mused, that he should intrude on his lieutenant's privacy at such a time. But the chance to witness such beauty after long centuries of idleness was too good to resist out of respect for stuffy decorum. Raziel would never know of his audience, his attention entirely engaged by the woman sharing his bed. Kain smirked at the young vampire's perfectly justifiable distraction. The Soul Reaver's aura shifted and stirred in the back of his mind showing signs of sharing his interest in the events taking place nearby. Not precisely aware of what was happening, he felt the soul within the sword stir and warm a little, its sleepy shivers of sympathetic desire stirring his blood as much as the elementary seduction playing itself out in the bed.

He'd used his own well-worn magics to mist-shift his oversized carcass through the partly open window of his child's bedroom, but it was the Reaver's shadow-cloak that kept him concealed on reforming. He looked down at himself and bit down on a chuckle before he gave himself away. There was nothing to be seen in his dim little corner of the room. The darkness covered him utterly, making it nearly impossible for anyone to see him either with eyes, or with occult talents. The sensation of heaviness, the dense warmth to the darkness around him was probably just his imagination. But the subtle magic almost seemed to caress his skin as the sword on his back murmured in his ear and warmed his spine.

He opened himself up to the weapon entirely, inviting it to feel his possessive pride with him at the sight of his eldest coming of age before him on the tangled sheets. Raziel had always been beautiful, in the Dark Empire, in the here and now, even as a wraith, the man had an undeniably beautiful, if wretched aspect. The reminder of what Raziel had become thanks to the Lake, and the Elder God only made his wholesome life in this 'restored' Nosgoth all the more miraculous. Kain studied his hands, little better than bruitish bone and leathery skin, and marveled at how his and Vorador's mutations were the only reminders left of how warped the world had been, or indeed would be come, if the Hylden's hellish energies were not contained. If they were ever a benign race, it was too late to regain such grace now. Even their auras had the ability to blight and twist the world around them thanks to their long centuries in hell.

Could the wraith within his blade remember being wholesome anymore? Was there anything left of him that remembered pleasure? Seduction? The pleasurable sensation of lips pressed to skin? He tilted his head back a little as he leaned into the corner, letting his cheek caress the massive weapon's hilt. It'd been a long time since they'd been close enough for such intimacy.

Raziel had lost interest in such voluntary intimacy long before his final evolution and destruction. Why had he driven the man away? Had Raziel's preoccupation with his clan in favor of his lord come about because of something _he_ had done? Or was it just the natural progression as they'd both grown older, more arrogant, more… monstrous. He sighed at the confusing nature of his maddened rationalization at the time.

All he knew was that over the centuries all of his children had spent less and less time with him, and more with their own offspring. They had become kings in their own right of their small corners of the empire, as it should have been. But Raziel, who had for hundreds of years, stood by his side both day and night to gradually lose interest in his attentions had been galling, he recalled. The growing power-struggle between them turned their later bedroom games from casual acts of sadism into something far more twisted. And yet, he told himself, regardless of blood spilled and humiliations suffered, the vampire had derived _some_ manner of pleasure from their wicked sport. Which then, of the two of them had been more insane? He with his jealously-untamable lust and paranoia? Or his lieutenant for needing such things so badly as to encourage him to further excess in order to feel properly sated.

Ironically the edge of guilt only made his enjoyment of Raziel's new innocence undone all the sharper. Kain bit the side of his tongue to keep from giving voice to his pleasure as he watched. The practical reality of their current physical incompatibility didn't stop him from fantasizing about doing any number of lewd things to his lieutenant as he observed Raziel with his new lover. Watching the young vampire tremble finish left him dry mouthed and aching with the beauty of it. Rolling on his side, Raziel unwittingly gave him more to admire as he caught his breath and politely listened to the gentle scolding his partner was heaping upon him.

Undoubtedly the boy was untried, Kain snorted to himself, but at the rate Lykestra was schooling him, he wouldn't stay a novice for long. Pushing her way up the mattress to lean against his headboard, she wasted no time in pulling his lieutenant's head into her lap. Understanding what she'd been heatedly whispering in his child's ear Kain almost laughed again, torn between wanting to add a chide of his own for the boy's thoughtlessness and a groan at the sight of the young vampire willingly dipping his head to his task in apology for his earlier selfishness.

How he missed that tongue, he sighed to himself at the sight of Raziel being tutored in the finer arts of pleasuring a woman by his demanding mistress. Lykestra poked and prodded her student for several moments while she set him to his task but then was compelled to leave off talking all together as he picked up the new skill with characteristic ease. She would have no further complaints, he wagered with himself feeling his blood warm with the continuing game playing out in front of him. Even if he'd been made of stone as he so often boasted, he was certain the sight of Raziel against the sheets could bring him to life. Even the Reaver blade seemed to respond to the pleasurable stimulus, thrumming with energy even as he was, alive in a way it hadn't been in years. He sighed softly at the sensation of its aura wrapping further around him, deepening the shadows that held him safe and discrete, almost embracing him as it crooned in his mind and soothed his trembling limbs.

_Raziel?_ He whispered to it, wondering if there was reason to match the emotions he was feeling. _Are you still with me, child?_

For a moment he was granted a burst of unmistakably Raziel-like affection tinged with drollery, the spirit within the blade reaching out to him as if to ask 'and just who are you panting over _now_, you old fool?' Hs smiled to himself at the undercurrent of implication that it was a marvel he could still be interested in such things at his advanced age. Trust his former Raziel to rub his face in his potential limitations. He tried to express to the sleepy presence at his back just how capable he still was by sharing a recently reawakened memories some of their more intimate moments together. The sword shivered, seeming to laugh at him as it once again sank into sleepy contentment. Kain squeezed his eyes tight shut, seeking to hang onto the fading presence a while longer despite the impossibility of it.

_No other lover could ever match you._ He couldn't help but remind the blade in a fit of maudlin sentimentality. The sleepy scoff he got in rebuttal before the wraith's aura faded entirely made his chest ache with what he'd lost. It would hardly have counted as a worthy sacrifice, Kain supposed grimly, if Raziel hadn't been bitterly missed. He smiled as he resumed his observation of the pair in the bed. His lieutenant was once again being bullied by his woman. Willingly pliant as she re-arranged him to suit her, Raziel was soon draped in an artful position for yet another round of carefree seduction.

Such stamina would undoubtedly make him fast friends with the women in the keep, Kain mused, admiring the smooth flex of his child's muscles as proved his earlier lessons hadn't been for nothing. The vampire's expression was one of abstract concentration, clearly determined to not make the same mistake twice with his lady. Lykestra gave him ample encouragement, not as superior now that her apprentice was getting into the swing of things. As fun as their coupling looked, Kain couldn't help but find something missing. Raziel as the aggressor was pleasant enough a distraction. The boy was lovely in his own right, especially when caught in the height of passion. But watching Raziel with a woman just wasn't what he was craving. Now if she was the agressor perhaps? Kain smirked at the tempting thought, knowing full well that Vorador's wives would be well familiar with acts far lewder than any human could imagine. She'd do it, he was certain, if he asked her to. Better yet, would she be willing to share? He mused. Adding a third actor to his private entertainment seemed the far more enjoyable scenario. Someone to show Raziel the other side of pleasure, and also indulge his personal desire to watch the boy shared by turns between lovers of each gender would be the perfect solution to the craving he was developing.

Historically he'd never been keen to share Raziel with other men, Kain considered his more relaxed outlook on possessing this new version of his once favorite lover. If he could have done the act himself, then certainly, it would be another matter entirely. But obliged to wait, he found he didn't feel particularly jealous, at the idea of someone else taking his place for a time.

The pair of lovers switched positions twice more as they indulged eachother's passion. Kain watched in quiet enjoyment as one lesson flowed seamlessly into the next. Lykestra was a woman of her word he had to acknowledge. She had promised to take his young protégé in hand, and she was doing nothing less. From innocent squire to well-laid soldier all within the course of a single day. Kain almost envied his child's comprehensive introduction to the opposite sex. His own tutorials as a boy had been far more piece-meal. Perks, he supposed, of having one's first encounter with an amazon. They were as shameless about their bodies, and their desires, as a woman possibly could be. Who better to show a young man what lovemaking ought to be like? And as Raziel had no memory of his human life from centuries before, there was no possibility of misplaced morals ruining his enjoyment of the carnal pleasures offered. Still, all good things had to come to an end. Exhausted Raziel fell back against the sheets a final time and not even his lover's encouragement could give him the will to move again.

Lykestra made a show of smoothing back his dark sweat-damp hair and kissing him companionably as they murmured some final nonsense to eachother. Kain sighed again as she did. Watching the vampire's eyes drift shut, he felt the moment when the boy succumbed to sleep at last. He'd earned it, Kain smirked to himself. Not half of the men who tried could perform as well on their first attempt at getting between an amazon's legs. Still, she seemed more like the fledgling's doting mother than his mistress as she climbed out of his bed in order to retrieve and organize first his bedding and then the room at large, undoing much of the chaos she had wrought in getting the man into bed in the first place. Only when she was done lacing closed her top did she stare cynically in his general direction. "I can't see you. But I know you're there."

"What gave me away?" He murmured softly, not wanting his voice to rouse the room's only sleeper.

"You made a noise when you…" Her eyebrow twitched in repressed amusement. "Forgot yourself for a moment. I take it my work tonight has been sufficient to please you?"

"There was never any doubt." Kain nudged the Soul Reaver into unraveling some of the shadows around him, giving the woman the ability to see his outline at least. "Your services are much appreciated in this matter. I trust you will have no problem with further instruction in the near future? It seems you have a willing pupil."

"Most willing." She smoothed back her wild mane and twisted it into a rough bun before pinning it to her head. "I'd almost forgotten how uninhibited the young could be. It makes a nice change from my usual, I suppose."

"When you feel he's mastered the basics, Lykestra, look amongst the cabal for a soldier capable of showing him the rest. I would not have any aspect of his education in this arena be lacking." He smirked at how she raised her eyebrow almost to her hairline in cynical amazement. "I leave it to your discretion as to whom would best serve the purpose, but I'm sure you've lovers enough in your past. One or two might oblige, if you were willing to encourage them."

"You think he would find such… lessons… enjoyable?" She rested her hands on her hips. "He seems game enough to try different things, I grant you, but I would not force such a… personal preference, upon him unwillingly."

"I imagine you'll find him very receptive." Kain snorted in amusement at her concerns. "And you'll be there, after all, to ensure that any other teachers that come are respectful of his relative youth."

"And you'll be there… watching… just for the sake of it?" Lykestra challenged with a bold smile. "How long, do you think, will you be able to look without touching for yourself?"

Kain willed himself to mist, leaning backwards through the wall as he made his escape. "As long as I have to, woman. And not a moment longer." Her laughter came to him from the other side of the window as he rematerialized on the balcony, more in need of Raziel's touch than ever. The cool dawn fogs gathering over the lake distracted him as he navigated along rooftops and ledges to his own rooms higher in the citadel. The fresh air only served to re-energize him further. Kain cursed his sudden libido, nagging at him after years of relative silence.

Stripping down in the privacy of his room to nothing other than his harness, Kain gave into baser urges with a curse. Again the Reaver blade trembled against his back, pinned between his body and the sheets as he sought his release. Its magic cut through some of the chill of the room, covering his arms in phantom flames as it blindly sought the source of his distress and frustration.

_Raziel!_ He called to it, wishing the soul within could manifest for even a moment. He craved the ghost might somehow become as real and solid in his arms as the boy sleeping off his passion several floors below. Whispers of lightening seemed to trace along his limbs, and within his veins, sparking and tormenting him as traceries of pleasure followed in their wake. Closing his eyes, Kain yearned with all his heart for the lover he'd once had, dredging his memories for a fantasy good enough to relieve a measure of the aching in his bones. Opening his eyes again he gasped at how the wish had become manifest, almost overcome by shock at the sight of lean muscles flexing before his eyes, the solid weight of Raziel spread over his hips. Caught in the act, he could do little other than gasp with the sudden pleasure of it. All the while Raziel moaned at the back of his throat in a croon of pure lust, moving with his rocking motions.

For a moment Kain was thrilled by the perfect recollection of his old empire. But once the initial moment of lust was replaced with the steady heat of satisfaction he realized it _wasn't_ his empire. The windows of his balcony streamed with golden mid-afternoon light. The dangerous element dared even to illuminate his bedding in places. He blinked at the sight of Raziel's leg, caught in a patch of sunlight, but seemingly entirely wholesome just the same. That clue forced him to acknowledge the far greater one that somehow he'd been ignoring.

Wings.

The man above him was positioned as he was not because of just some whimsical desire, but because any other arrangement would have been decidedly difficult with the enormous appendages mounted between his shoulder blades. They were partly fanned out behind Raziel acting a counterbalance, Kain mused, to his otherwise unsteady angle. With each moment of shared delight they flexed a little, their hidden muscles bunching with his lieutenant's pleasure even as the vampire's stomach did. This wasn't his old Raziel, he thought dazedly as he stared up at the handsome vampire above him, but some new one? It was hard to worry or even feel surprised when all that he wanted was to finish what they'd started without delay.

"_What are you waiting for, an invitation?_" Raziel opened his eyes to stare down at him in playful challenge. Kain lost himself without further prompting, taking the paradise offered. For his part, the dark winged angel above him simply threw back his head and cried out his joy as he too celebrated their union.

Blinking again Kain hissed in annoyance to find himself alone in his bedroom, dawn only just breaking outside his window. He sighed and wiped them on the sheets feeling too boneless to do something productive like clean himself up just yet. He flipped a corner of his quilt over his hips for the sake of any fool who might barge in, and pillowed his head on his sword's hilt for a nap. "You're not supposed to be encouraging me, you know." He murmured to the sleepy aura of the weapon at his back. "If I didn't know better, I'd say you approved of this idiotic plan of mine to debauch you a second time in as many lifetimes. You would think you'd have learned by now that sleeping with me can only bring trouble."

The sword ignored him, as Raziel often did after sex when he gave in to the impulse to talk nonsense for a while. He snorted in tired amusement at how predictable the man was, even now. Closing his eyes Kain told himself that he could afford a short nap, after the night he'd had. It was the most fun he'd had at a party in centuries


End file.
